Switchverse
by webhead112233
Summary: The story of SU, but with a few key details, well, switched around. You'd be surprised how much difference a small change can make.
1. Chapter 1

Steven was on his way home, looking down in disappointment. After learning that his favorite snack, an ice cream treat called Lion Lickers, had been discontinued, he just wanted to go home and talk to the gems about it. He crossed the street and walked passed the long torn down fense onto the beach, and made his way to the giant, eight armed, two faced statue of a woman that was carved into the cliff overlooking the ocean.

Said statue also had the entrance to the temple, and by proxy, Steven's room, right beneath it, one of the two faces of the statue always looking down at the entrance as though watching over it. Steven walked up the steps to the temple and walked inside. The moment he did so, he was tackled to the ground.

Steven yelped in surprise and fear as the strange monster wrapped around him, four tendrils squeezing his arms and legs as a large fanged mouth snapped at his face. The creature looked like some kind of plant, and Steven squirmed to get away from the bizarre gem monster.

Thankfully, before the creature could bite Steven's head off or strangle him with its tendrils, it was grabbed around the middle by an armored hand and pried off of him. "Sorry Steven," Ruby, one of the three gems who lived with Steven, said as she threw the creature across the room, throwing a fireball at it from her gauntlet. She was short, less than an inch taller than Steven, with red skin, a simple red t-shirt and shorts, and a red bandanna tied around her almost square looking hair.

"These Slinkers got inside your room while we were out training." Ruby said, her gauntlet heating up as fire surrounded her fist. She punched another of the Slinkers, causing it to poof into a cloud of mist, though confusingly no gemstone came out of it.

As Ruby noticed this, looking down at where the gemstone should have landed, she didn't notice the Slinker about to drop down onto her from above. Fortunately, before it could grab her, it was frozen by a blast of icy air from Sapphire.

The blue haired, blue skinned gem wore a matched blue dress and white gloves, so only her face was usually visible, and right now even it wasn't as she had her shades over her eyes. She stood at about the same height as Ruby. She used the shades to focus her future sight power and target Slinkers before they even knew where they were going to attack. When she was locked on, she held out her hand and fired another jet, freezing two more Slinkers in their tracks. "They were probably trying to get into the temple through here." Sapphire said.

"Uh, guys," Ruby said as she poofed two of the frozen Slinkers, "These things don't have any gems in them. What's it mean Opal?" She asked, turning to the last of the three gems.

Opal stood at nearly seven feet tall, and light bluish/purplish skin and her long platinum hair in a ponytail. She wore long purple pants, with a light blue top that seemed to end in something like a dress below her waist. Her arms looked quite large, which was attributed to their ability to split from two arms into four whenever Opal needed them to. She held a bow and arrow, firing arrows of light at the many Slinkers infesting the room.

Most noticeably, she had two gems on her body, one on her forehead and one in the center of her chest. Ruby and Sapphire both had gems, in their right and left palms respectively, but Opal was the only gem Steven had ever seen with two gems, which he figured was just because she was the strongest. Then again, these three were the only gems he had actually seen.

"These are just the drones," Opal said, "The Slinker mother must be somewhere else. These are a distraction." Opal fired an arrow that didn't even seem to hit anything, just burst into rays of light that spread out everywhere, poofing the remaining Slinker drones into many clouds of dark blue mist.

"That was awesome!" Steven said with an excited smile, "Why don't you guys ever let me help you out with gem stuff? I'm a gem to right?" He questioned, lifting his shirt to show the pink quartz gem in the center of his stomach.

"Of course you're a gem Steven, but you still aren't ready Steven," Sapphire said calmly, "You haven't even been able to tap into your powers yet, let alone summon a weapon. Until you can defend yourself, it wouldn't be a good idea for you to try fighting monsters with us."

Ruby's gauntlet vanished off of her hand, and Opal's bow disappeared as well, but Sapphire always left her shades out, as she didn't like not having her future vision focused at all times.

Steven sighed, leaning back against the wall, "I guess you're right." He said in disappointment. Ruby smiled, "But we've still got a consolation prize for you!" She said excitedly. "Look in the freezer." Opal said with a matching smile.

Steven, confused and curious, went over to the fridge and opened the freezer door, his eyes widening in surprise and excitement when he saw that inside were dozens of his supposedly discontinued Lion Lickers. "Wha!? I thought these were discontinued!" Steven said.

"We heard that to," Opal said, "So we went out and stone a bunch for you!" Ruby said. "Correction, you went out and stole a bunch, me and Opal paid for them." Sapphire said, crossing her arms. "Yeah, with money we stole." Ruby said. "We didn't steal it, we won it fair and square." Sapphire said, getting annoyed. "Right, fair and square. Using our gem powers in a contest against normal humans. Totally not theft." Ruby said, making her point.

Sapphire took a deep breath to calm herself, not wanting to get into another argument with Ruby right now. Ruby just chuckled at her victory as Steven opened the Lion Licker and started to eat the ice cream bar, leaning against the fridge as the familiar taste relaxed him. The sounds of Ruby and Sapphire's bickering as Opal just enjoyed the show faded away, the Lion Licker theme from the commercials playing in his head.

It wasn't until the gems all went silent that Steven became aware of them again. They were all staring at him, and he wasn't quite sure why, until he realized that his gemstone was glowing. His gem was trying to summon a weapon, the blade of a sword started to form, but it faded before it could form and the pink glow from his gem died back down.

"W-what? No, no! Come back!" Steven pleaded desperately, shaking his stomach in an effort to make his gem start to glow again. Alas, no glowing returned. "Nooo! I finally got it working! You all saw it right?" Steven questioned, hoping they all knew he wasn't making it up.

"We saw it," Ruby confirmed, "You were about to summon a sword." "He's got the sword.." Sapphire repeated, though she seemed almost to be speaking to herself. Steven wasn't quite sure what Sapphire meant by 'the' sword, but he was excited to have seen what his weapon would be. "It looks like you won't have too much longer before your powers really do start to manifest." Opal said with a smile.

"But I don't want to wait, I want to help you guys fight and stuff!" Steven said. "We understand Steven, but you've got to be patient," Sapphire said, "You'll be able to summon your weapon and access all kinds of powers eventually, and until then, we can help you learn to control them."

"Really?" Steven asked excitedly. The gems had never actually offered to help him learn this stuff, because until now, they weren't sure he would ever need to. This was the first time Steven's gem had ever shown any kind of activity, and now that it had, they all saw the potential of a strong gem fighter in him.

"So, what's it like for you to summon your weapon?" Steven asked Sapphire. They were out on the cliff above the temple statue, looking over the ocean, the place where Sapphire always came when she wanted to meditate or try and see further into the future. The gems had decided to take turns talking with Steven, as all three of them trying to tell him how gem powers work would be a problematic situation at best.

For the exercise, Sapphire had removed her shades, showing Steven her one, singular blue right right above her nose. Steven didn't see it often, so he still found it kinda hard not to stare at it whenever it was out.

"It's all about focusing Steven," Sapphire said, "Listen to the wind around you, be aware of the track of fate, how it can be altered ever so slightly by one's actions, be prepared to accept all consequences for every action you make. If you're focused and in balance with the world around you," Sapphire's left hand passed over her face, her shades appearing and covering her eye, "Then summoning your weapon is a simple matter. The same principle can be applied to the use of your gem powers. They're different for every gem, unique and in need of inner focus for the gem using them."

Sapphire held her hand up in the air. Steven felt the sunny day become cold around him, several ice crystals appearing as the water within the air froze to form them. All fell to the ground, forming a perfect circle around Steven.

"It's all about keeping balance with yourself and everything in the world around you." Sapphire said with a smile.

"Did she do the ice crystal thing?" Ruby asked Steven. They were inside the temple, as Ruby liked it better than being outside. For someone who lived right outside the beach, she seemed to hate the beach a lot, particularly the water.

"Uh..yeah." Steven said. Ruby just shook her head, "For someone who can see the future, she sure repeats herself a lot. Look, all that 'focus and be balanced' stuff is nonsense. Take me for example. I don't need to focus in all things around me to summon my weapon or my powers. I just do it."

To prove her point, Ruby held out her hand, her gauntlet summoning instantly around her hand, and catching fire just as quickly. She threw the fireball up into their air, catching it with her other hand. "See? Nothing to it at all, it's just about doing it without thinking." Ruby said, squeezing her hand around the fireball to make it disappear.

"How am I supposed to focus on everything, and just do it without thinking at the same time?" Steven questioned Opal. They were outside on the beach, next to the temple and in front of the water, where Opal went for target practice.

"You probably can't," Opal said, "Every gem is different remember? For example, I don't 'become aware of everything' or 'just stop thinking about it altogether'. For me, it's an in the moment thing. I just think about what I need to do, what my goal is, and," Opal's bow appeared in her hands, "Simple as that for me, but that's just me. It could be completely different for you. Same thing goes for powers. Just because it worked for one gem doesn't mean it'll work for everyone. You need to find what works for you."

Steven nodded his understanding. It was still a little unsure about the whole thing, but it was more than he had understood up to that point. As he went back to the temple, Opal continuing her target practice, he thought about what might work for him. This thought process led him to think about what he had been doing when his gem first started glowing.

Realizing that it had first happened when he had been eating a Lion Licker, he quickly rushed inside the house to get another, certain that it would help him summon his weapon. He went quickly to the kitchen and grabbed a Lion Licker from the freezer, pulling the wrapper off and beginning to eat it frantically.

It tasted delicious, but his gem didn't start glowing again. He sighed in disappointment. "Oh come on, why isn't this working?" He questioned himself. He didn't have any answers for it though, and just lowered into a sitting positioned on the floor.

He looked up at the painted picture that had been hanging above of the doorway as long as Steven could remember the house itself being there, a portrait of his mother, Rose Quartz. Steven still didn't fully understand why his mother wasn't around, just what the gems had his dad had told him, about how she had needed to give up her physical form in order for Steven to be born with her gem.

Steven wondered if he would ever be able to make the gems feel like Rose had done the right right thing in giving up her gem for Steven. His depressing train of thought was interrupted however, when he heard the sounds of a struggle coming from outside.

Steven quickly rushed outside to see what the problem was, and gasped when he saw it: the Slinker, the real Slinker. It was much, much bigger than any of its drones had been, and its plant root-like tendrils had already ensnared Ruby and Sapphire, both of whom were trying their best to escape, but not having much luck. Only Opal wasn't get caught, gracefully avoiding the Slinker's tendrils and snapping jaw as she summoned her bow and started firing.

None of her arrows seemed to do much damage though, and Opal and Steven both quickly realized that she would need to get a shot into the creature's mouth to poof it, which wasn't going to happen while it was focused on Opal.

Steven didn't hesitate to do what he did next. He ran forward, jumping over the side of the stairs and crashing into the Slinker. The Slinker hissed in anger, all her focus now on him. Steven only realized that his brilliant plan may have been a bit flawed when he was entirely ensnared by the creature's tendrils and being lowered into its mouth.

Before it could snap him up though, Ruby and Sapphire, who had been freed when all the Slinker's attention turned to Steven, jumped into action. Ruby threw a fireball at the Slinker's tendrils, making it drop Steven. She jumped up, catching and throwing him out of the Slinker's mouth as she summoned her gauntlet to hold the Slinker's mouth open. Sapphire sent a blast of cold at the Slinker, freezing it in place as Opal charged up an arrow. When the Slinker was frozen with her mouth open, Ruby jumped out of the way, letting Opal get a direct shot inside.

The Slinker poofed in a cloud of purple smoke, a smooth, blue gem falling to the ground near where Steven had landed. He picked it up as the others rushed to him. "Steven that was awesome!" Ruby said, punching him in the arm affectionately, though with her hand still hot from throwing a ball of fire, it hurt a bit more than she probably meant it to.

"Steven, that was insanely reckless, do you know how many chances there were for that to go wrong!?" Sapphire questioned, though before she could actually start listing off all the possible alternate futures where Steven's plan went horribly wrong, Opal reminded her that they were living in the one where it hadn't. "Steven just completed the mission for us." Opal said warmly.

On some level, Steven understood that Opal would have probably found a way to save the day without him, but for the moment, he just relished the fact that he had been able to help the gems, even without being able to summon his weapon.

* * *

 **For obvious reasons, I won't be doing a Switchverse version of every single episode of Steven Universe, just episodes where I think a switch would be interesting; like any and every episode featuring fusions for example.**


	2. Chapter 2

The jungle was very dense, very humid, and very annoying. Steven didn't mind it too terribly much though, as he was just happy that the gems were actually letting him come with them on a mission. Granted, it wasn't a mission to battle a big magical monster or anything, but it was still a mission.

"We need to find the Jungle Sphere," Opal said. She was the only one seemed perfectly okay with the jungle area. Ruby seemed to be one step away from trying to fire punch her way through the place, which was bound to turn bad if she actually tried, and for once Sapphire was on board with her, ready to freeze the place over if she could. She had probably only held back from doing so because of her future vision telling her it was a bad idea.

"What's the Jungle Sphere?" Steven asked, taking pictures of the different plants as they passed by them. "It's an ancient gem artifact that was left out here for far too long," Sapphire explained, "It can manipulate the structure of plants to creature towers and strongholds out of the organic plant-life."

"Woah, that sounds cool!" Steven said. Ruby nodded, "It used to just be focused on holding this one huge castle made out of a tree together, but something messed it up, and now it's just building stuff wherever and letting them fall apart again."

"Too dangerous to leave out here." Opal said, "We'll have to find it and bubble it, just like the monsters." Steven nodded, understanding. Well, understanding somewhat. "So, what's it look like whenever it builds stuff?"

Steven got his answer almost instantly. Directly in front of the gems, a series of roots sprung up from the ground, all wrapping around each other and forming a large wall in front of them. Opal draw her bow and Ruby summoned her gauntlet, but the wall of roots fell apart all by itself before it was even attacked.

"Like that." Sapphire said with a sigh, "We must be getting closer, let's keep moving." The gems continued forward, Steven taking a picture of the now crumbled wall of plants. The deeper into the jungle they got, the stranger things seemed to get. Watch towers formed out of several trees tied together by vines, chairs would appear out of the sides of plants and tablets would fall out of the trees.

After a bit more walking, they finally spotted the Jungle Sphere, a porcelain looking orb that was sitting on a pedestal carved out of a tree stump. Green energy was seeping down from the orb into the floor of the jungle in short bursts as opposed to the steady stream Sapphire said it was supposed to be.

"The Sphere must have been damaged from the lack of care. We should have gotten long before now, but we've been kept busy by other missions." Sapphire said. Ruby went towards the stump, reaching out to grab the Sphere. This was a mistake, which Sapphire foresaw and warned Ruby about just a second too late to prevent what happened next.

The Sphere recognized Ruby's gauntlet as a weapon, and assuming that Ruby intended to damage it, reacted to protect itself, letting out a powerful burst of green energy into the ground that caused a tower of trees and bamboo to form around it, thorn covered vines lining the wall to protect it.

"Think you can get away that easy do ya!?" Ruby shouted, taking this as a challenge. Her gauntlet lit up with fire and she began punching and pulling apart the wall, though it seemed to re-grow itself just as quickly as she was able to pull it apart. Sapphire tried to help, freezing parts of the plants to make it easier to get through, and Opal fired on as well with her bow. Even with all three attacking at once, the process was slow going.

Steven, knowing there wouldn't be much he could do to help the current situation, sat down nearby and watched the gems attack the wall of plants. He took a few pictures of them as they did, then became aware of breathing suspiciously near his head.

Turning his head, Steven was greeted with something he was sincerely not expecting to see in the jungle: a large, pink furred wolf. It looked down blankly at Steven, who was staring back with stars at his eyes at the appearance of the creature.

"Guys, I found a wolf!" Steven shouted. "Yeah, cool Steven." Ruby shouted back, being the only one aware he'd said anything, and not really hearing what it was he had said, as she was more focused on prying apart the wall of vegetation between her and the Jungle Sphere.

Steven on the other hand had completely forgotten about the magic ball that controlled the jungle, all of his attention going to the pink wolf, who had decided to simply refer to as Wolf. Wolf didn't seem to mind Steven's petting him, which Steven could safely say was odd all things considered, but awesome nonetheless.

As Steven's hands rubbed across Wolf's almost plushie soft pink fur, something began to glow when he got near the center of the canine's chest. Steven was confused by this, wondering if there was something inside the Lion's fur. Before he could investigate further though, the gems stepped back away from the hole they had made in the plant wall.

It was several feet deep, though not quite to the other side yet. The gems caught their breath and were about to start up again when the hole sealed itself with even thicker vegetation than what had been there when they had first started.

"Oh come on!" Ruby shouted in frustration, her whole body briefly bursting into flames as she charged the wall, her flaming tackle doing little if anything to the wall before she fell to the ground and laid on her back, seemingly having given up.

"We could always try to hit it with something bigger." Ruby suggested, her meaning clear to Opal and Sapphire, though Steven wasn't sure what she meant. "I suppose it would be efficient, I'll see who would be the best pick for it and then we'll-"

Before Sapphire could activate her future sight to check who the best pick would be, which Steven made a mental note to ask the meaning of later, Wolf stood up from where he had sat down next to Steven and walked over to the plant wall. Wolf stood in front of the wall, opened his mouth, and howled.

It was much, much louder than Steven or the gems had been expecting, and when he did it, a wave of energy left his mouth and hit the plant wall, a glowing hole forming on it. Steven gasped, his mental note now forgotten as Wolf jumped through the magical hole in the wall and exited the hole with the Jungle Sphere in his mouth like a ball.

"He's helping us out!" Steven said with a smile, walking up to Wolf, "What is this thing?" Sapphire questioned, unsure what kind of earth creature could do such a thing. To her knowledge, none at all.

"It could be another monster." Ruby suggested. "Then why isn't it attacking us?" Opal questioned, "More over, why is it actually helping us?" She added as Wolf dropped the Jungle Sphere into Steven's hands. Not that it was no longer attached to the ground, the wall of plants slowly broke down, and the jungle returned to normal.

"Gross, it's all covered in Wolf drool." Steven said, though Opal didn't seem to mind as she took the item, bubbled it, and sent it back to the temple. "We'll deal with it later." Opal said to Ruby and Sapphire, "Thank you for your help." She said to Wolf, who responded with just another blank look as Steven and the others began to leave.

As they left though, they realized that Wolf was following them. "You gotta stay here." Steven told Wolf. the pink canine seemed to obey, sitting down on the ground. Then, when the gems started walking off again, so to did Wolf, following them all the way to the warp pad at the edge of the island where the jungle was located.

"I think he wants to come with us." Steven said. "But why?" Sapphire questioned, "What if he's dangerous?" "Well, he's had plenty of opportunities to maul us, and he hasn't so far. He seems nice." Ruby said as Wolf came over, once again letting Steven pet him. "Probably just instinct. Wild animals usually won't attack if they're certain an enemy is much stronger than them unless the enemy forces them to." Sapphire said.

"Did you see that power howl? If he wanted to fight us, he wouldn't have too much trouble. At the very least, he wouldn't have to worry about getting away before we caught him." Ruby said. Opal nodded, "He seems fond of Steven," She said, "What's more, Steven seems fond of him."

And that was really the deciding factor. They couldn't really say no to Steven when he wanted something, so long as it wasn't something immediately dangerous. And as confused as she was by it, Sapphire could see no immediate threat, or really any threat to Steven or the gems at all, coming from Wolf.

"That settles it, the wolf comes with us." Opal said, picking Wolf up like a lap dog and bringing him onto the warp pad.

* * *

 **Sorry if this one feels shorter than the previous, the length of the chapter really depends on how much content I can think of an existing episode to get swapped. Or rather, how much content I can think of an will enjoy writing. Some will be longer, some will be shorter.**

 **And to answer a question from the reviews, no, I won't be doing every single episode with Garnet in it just to replace her with Opal to show off Opal's power, but I might do a version of Giant Woman with Garnet. I was considering leaving the episode out because there'd really only be the one scene that changes, but it's still an important episode, introducing one of the most interesting and important concepts, the concept of fusion, into the show. So I'll leave it up to you, the next chapter will either be Giant Woman or Coach Steven, which would you prefer?**


	3. Chapter 3

Steven was sitting in a tall lifeguard's chair above a game of chess between Ruby and Sapphire. The rules were simply. If you took too long making your move, you got hit with a water balloon. If you lost a piece, you got hit with a water balloon. And if you lost, you got hit with all the remaining water balloons.

Both of them seemed to take a little issue with this. Ruby didn't mind the water balloons, they were the only thing keeping her from burning the board in frustration of the game itself. Sapphire loved chess, possibly because she could plan dozens of moves ahead, what with her being able to literally see what moves were most likely to be made, but was most certainly not enjoying the water balloon pelting.

"Is this really necessary?" Sapphire asked as she was hit with another water balloon from above. "Yeah, this way every move matters." Steven said, chucking a water balloon at Ruby when she lost another pawn. The water began to steam off of her in annoyance of her piece being taken.

"But it's chess, every move already matters." Sapphire insisted, getting water ballooned again as Ruby took down one of her knights. "I think you're just a sore loser." Ruby said with a smirk as she took the knight off the board.

Sapphire took a deep breath, then smiled, "How can I be a sore loser when I've just won the game?" Sapphire questioned, moving her queen so that Ruby's king was trapped between a queen, rook, and bishop, "Checkmate."

Ruby's gauntlet formed around her hand and her skin started to light up, fire about to form, but she was cooled down, both literally and metaphorically, when all the raining water balloons she had rained down on her from Steven. Ruby sighed, "Thanks Steven," She said, feeling better, "I guess sometimes it feels better to lose, especially when being a winner looks like that." Ruby said, pointing to Sapphire.

Sapphire's expression couldn't really be seen through her shades, but it was quite evident that she was not happy about this, "Well I hope that isn't how you think about things during a battle." Sapphire said.

Ruby groaned in annoyance, "Why are you so boring now? This is why we never form Garnet anymore." She said. Sapphire gasped at this, like it was some huge insult, "We never form Garnet because you're difficult and frustrating." Sapphire said, poking Ruby accusingly.

"We don't form Garnet because you're a snobby little priss." Ruby said through clenched teeth. "We don't form Garnet bec-" Sapphire was cut off by Steven, who'd climbed down from his chair and now separated the two gems, "Guys, guys, what is Garnet?" Steven asked curiously.

"Oh you know, it's me and Sapphire, jammed together." Ruby said. Sapphire scoffed, "That's a very crude way of putting one of our most magical of abilities don't you think?" "Yeah, what of it?" Ruby questioned.

Sapphire sighed in frustration and held out her hands. Tiny ice crystals formed in the shape of Ruby and Sapphire, "Steven, when we synchronize our bodies, we can merge together into a single being," The crystal crystals twirled into each other, forming a single, taller woman, "a powerful fusion gem named Garnet."

"So you two can just fuse into a giant woman whenever you want?! That's awesome!" Steven said. "Yeah, Garnet's really cool," Ruby said, "Super tall, super tough, and she's even got Sapphire's future vision. She's even got powers that neither of us have at all."

"Wow! You should form Garnet right now!" Steven said, Sapphire shaking her head, "We only form Garnet when absolutely necessary. Fusion is serious business Steven." "But I want to see a giant woman.." Steven frowned.

Before he could continue to argue why they should fuse, Opal called them into the temple for a mission. "I've located the Heaven and Earth Beetles." Opal said. "They're ancient gem artifacts. Leaving them out would be dangerous. We need to retrieve them before they go on the fritz like the Jungle Sphere did."

"Where are they?" Ruby asked. "The Heaven Beetle is at the very top of the sky spire. I'm the only one who'll be able to balance up there. You three are going to get the Earth Beetle. It's on a mini-island in the middle of a boiling lava lake. Steven's bubble can protect him from it, and you and Sapphire's powers will counteract the lava. Good luck."

Opal stepped onto the warp pad and teleported away. "Well, let's just hurry up and get this over with." Sapphire said. "I bet Garnet could get it done super fast." Steven commented with a grin, both gems sighing when they realized, not only was he not going to stop, but he was about to start singing.

"All I wanna do, is see you turn into, a giant woman, a giant woman. Come on the two of you, just think what you could do, as a giant woman, a giant woman.

All I wanna see, it what you two could be, as a giant woman, a giant woman. Come on it might be fun, you can get the mission done, as a giant woman, a giant woman.

Maybe you like being together, if not it doesn't need to last forever, but if it were me, I would really like to be, a giant woman, a giant woman.

All I wanna do, is see you turn into, a giant woman."

By the time Steven's song had ended, the three of them had already warped to the cave where the beetle would be and walked a good distance towards the lava. Sapphire had begun using her powers to keep an aura of cool air around her and Steven while Ruby marched forward unhindered by the heat.

"Steven, would you please give it a rest? We don't need Garnet for this." Ruby said, pointing across the lava to the rock where the Earth Beetle was sitting. "See, the magic bug is right there. All I need to do is-" Before Ruby could take another step, a monster dropped down onto then from above, as if the cave had taken Ruby's calling the mission easy as a sort of challenge.

The creature was big, like a giant green and black centipede with a single eye between its two massive fangs, both of which were dripping with a thick green slime that seemed to melt the rock wherever it dripped onto the ground.

"Oh come on!" Ruby summoned her gauntlet and threw a ball of fire at the creature. Unfortunately that, and Sapphire's ice blast, both seemed to do little more to the large creature than annoy it. It let out a loud shriek and snapped at Ruby, who managed to escape by punching the creature in the eye and running when it dropped her.

All three hid inside of a nearby cave in the rock. It was big inside, more than large enough for the three of them, but the entrance was too small for the creature to get inside. "Where's the future vision on that huh?" Ruby questioned.

"I've told you a million times, none of what I see is one hundred percent. There was only a three percent chance that the Centipeetle was still down here, and even if it was, there was only a two percent chance that it hadn't drowned in the lava by now." Sapphire said.

"You mean you knew that thing might be down here!?" Ruby questioned. "I thought it would be poofed already okay!" Sapphire shouted back. "Guys! Calm down, I think you both know what it's time for." Steven said with a smile.

Ruby facepalmed, "Ugh, I think he's right." Sapphire nodded with a sigh, "Alright, let's do this."

The two gems came together, Ruby taking one of Sapphire's hands and placing one of her hips as they began to dance. It… wasn't great. Sapphire was trying almost too hard to make sure each step was perfect when they didn't need to be, and Ruby was trying to rush through it quickly. As a result, when they started to glow and merge together, they separated before the fusion gem was even formed.

The two burst into argument over who's fault it was immediately. Only now, as he started to sweat from the heat of the nearby lava with a Centipeetle lurking outside the cave, did Steven realize he may have pushed them too far. It was his fault, Steven thought, but he also thought that he could fix it.

Looking outside the cave, he couldn't see the Centipeetle, so he figured it must have been somewhere higher up in the cave. If Steven ran, he might be able to reach the lava lake before it came down to get him. Then he could use his bubble to get across the lake and get the bug.

He hadn't quite worked out what he would do after he had the bug, but he figured he would handle that later. He ran outside of the cave, and immediately realized his first mistake. The Centipeetle was not high up on the cave walls, it had been waiting for him directly above the entrance to the cave he and the others were in.

Steven only barely formed a bubble around himself before the jaws of the creature snapped down around it. The force of the jaws was enough to pop it, and the force of the pop sent Steven flying through the air where he landed on the rock next to the Earth Beetle.

"Steven!" Ruby and Sapphire shouted when they realized what was happening. "It's okay guys, I've got the bug!" He shouted, holding up the Earth Beetle. He didn't think they were going to believe him though, as his statement was immediately followed by the Centipeetle swallowing him.

He managed to bubble himself again, so the acid spit never touched him, but with how creepy the inside of the Centipeetle was, too dark to see anything outside of his bubble, Steven wasn't sure what he should, or even what he could, do next.

He sat there in the darkness, holding onto the Earth Beetle as he tried not to panic. Then, less than a minute later, something happened. Something punched through the Centipeetle's body, causing lava to flow into it. Steven's bubble kept him safe, but whatever had punched through the Centipeetle then grabbed his bubble and pulled him out of the lava.

Looking up, Steven realized who was holding him. She was tall, almost taller than Opal, with a thick, square hair cut like a bigger version of Ruby's. She wore a purple outfit with shoulder pads like Sapphire's and a star design across her chest. She had on massive gauntlets on her hands like Ruby's, but Ruby's had never been this big, and she had only ever had one. Finally, she had Sapphire's shades on over her eyes.

This, he realized, was Garnet.

She jumped up, landed on a ledge much higher up and setting down Steven, who dropped his bubble so he could watch as Garnet jumped down. Her punch collided with the Centipeetle like a meteor, sending up a spray of lava and crushed rock as green shards shattered, all of them forming into mini-Centipeetles.

Garnet jumped away from the rock where they were all on, standing knee deep in the lava completely un-fazed. She took a stance like a boxer, and punched out a bolt of lightning that shot forward and collided with the rock, poofing all the Centipeetles instantly.

Garnet walked out of the lava and jumped up to get Steven, who was staring with his jaw dropped and stars in his eyes. "Do...do you know who I am?" Steven asked, not sure how the fusion's memories would work.

Garnet chuckled, her gauntlet vanishing along with her shades, showing she had three eyes, one red, one blue, and a third on her forehead that was purple. "All you wanna do, is see me turn into,"

"A giant woman." Steven finished in a hushed voice, grinning ear to ear.

Steven and Garnet returned home, where Opal already had the Heaven Beetle bubbled. Garnet unfused back into Ruby and Sapphire as Steven handed Opal the Earth Beetle. Opal placed the Earth Beetle in the same bubble as the Heaven Beetle and said, "Good work you three. Steven, I'm impressed with you helping your teammates to fuse."

"All I had to do was get eaten by a giant bug." Steven said with a smile. "Nice work." Opal said, "You'll be excellent at fusing one day." She added. "Yeah...wait, I can do that do!?" Steven questioned.

* * *

 **That was actually more fun to write than I expected, thank you all for suggesting it. ^-^**


	4. Chapter 4

**Before anyone asks, I triple checked, yes, Fire Opal is in fact an actual thing.**

* * *

Steven and the other gems appeared on the a warp pad in a place Steven had never been before. It was a relatively empty field of strawberries, save of course for the giant building resembling an inverted pyramid. It was huge, bigger even than the temple statue, and supported by several pillars to keep it from falling over, at least that was what Steven assumed they were for.

"Woah, what is this place?" Steven asked. "This pyramid is an old gem structure," Sapphire said, "It was a fortress back in the old days, used for storing equipment and training the most elite of gems. It's been shut down for a long time, but recently something caused it to activate again, and the bursts of electromagnetic energy it's letting off is interfering with human satellite technology."

Steven turned to Opal, hoping she could explain whatever Sapphire has just said. "It's hurting the TV." Opal said, Steven gasping, "No! I'll save you TV!" Steven said, running over to one of the pillars holding up the pyramid and starting to punch and kick it, though he was doing more damage to himself than he was doing to the pyramid's pillar, eventually giving up as he panted tiredly.

Ruby snickered, pulling Steven back, "Sorry Steven, for something like this, we'd need a Steven at least this strong!" To demonstrate, Ruby shape-shifted to make herself look like a taller, more muscled version of Steven with her gauntlet on. Ruby began to punching the pillar, but due to it's thickness and toughness, even Ruby's strength matched with her gauntlet took her several strikes to even take a single chip off of the pillar, and not even a very big chunk to begin with. Eventually, even Ruby started to get tired and bored with it, and returned back to her normal form.

Sapphire sighed, "We could be here all day if we try taking out the pillars individually, not to mention that we'd still need to do enough damage to the core of the pyramid to cut off all the energy flowing through the mechanisms inside. I can already see it with my future vision, us here until mid-night at least if we do it your way."

Ruby grumbled in annoyance, "I hate it when you're right about stuff." She said, scowling when Sapphire smiled smugly at her, "Don't whine, all we need to do is construct a simple, well thought out and strategic plan to-" "No," Opal cut Sapphire off, "What we need is Fire Opal. Ruby, fuse with me."

Steven saw two very different reactions from the two other gems. Ruby's eyes widened in excitement and shock, and she let out a triumphant shout, punching her fish into the air. Sapphire on the other hand, seemed to frown nervously, "Um, Opal, that might not be the best idea. I've seen a few of the different futures involving Fire Opal...many of them do not turn out well." She warned, Ruby frowning in disappointment, looking up to Opal for the decision.

"Well, do you see any versions of the future where your strategic plans backfire on us?" Opal asked. "Well... yes..but-" Sapphire started, Opal stopping her, "There's always the chance that things go wrong, but this is the fastest, and most fun, way to handle it. Let's go Ruby." Ruby jumped in excitement, running over with Opal as Steven watched in excitement, eager to see another fusion gem.

Opal and Ruby stood a few feet away from each other, and began to dance. Ruby's dance was energetic and erratic, and Opal seemed to mimic the form herself, though her movements were more fluid as her thick arms separated into four as they so rarely did. Ruby's dancing brought her over to Opal, who took her hand and pulled her hard. Instead of crash into Opal's body, like the motion would have caused under normal circumstances, both gem's bodies seemed to fade into light and merge together into one form; and that one form grew huge before the light faded and her body became visible.

Her skin was light red and grainy, with her outfit looking more like Opal's, though thicker and covering more of everything, save for her arms, which were completely on display. Where's Opal's four arms were slender enough to attach together and look like two normal arms, like they so often were kept, this gem's four arms were massive and muscular. She seemed to have two massive fangs like a saber-tooth among her normal teeth, and her hair fell down in a ponytail behind her and two pig tails on either side of her head.

"Woah! Are you Fire Opal?" Steven asked excitedly. She smiled, "You got it kid. Whatcha think?" She asked, flexing her four massive arms. "You look awesome!" Steven shouted with a smile, Fire Opal grinning, "Wanna see something even cooler?"

When Steven nodded, Fire Opal pulled out Opal's bow. The string that she knocked the arrows on detached from one side. As it swung up, Ruby's gauntlet appear on one hand, and she wrapped it around the end of the string, where it solidified as the handle of the bow shrunk and thickened. Finally, several spikes jutted out of the metal ball that had once been a gauntlet, and the spiked ball went up in flames.

Steven was awestruck, and didn't notice that Sapphire had only become more and more nervous with every passing second. "Are you gonna smash stuff with your morning star?" Steven asked. "That's the plan." Fire Opal said, two hands lifting the handle of the morning star and swinging it so the flaming spikes collided with one of the pillars, destroying a pillar twice as thick as the one Steven and Ruby had hailed to break in mere seconds.

Sapphire started moving before the debris even started falling, her future vision predicting where the massive chunks of stone would land and letting her avoid them and pull Steven along so he didn't get hurt either. As Fire Opal continued to smash into more and more pillars, more and more debris fell. Eventually, Sapphire found a point where no matter which direction she went, something would crash into her. The only solution was for her so send a blast of icy coldness at it, causing it to freeze over and shatter before it could hit them.

Too late Sapphire realized the mistake in her plan, and a smaller chunk of the stone flew from the rock and nailed Steven in the side of the face. Fire Opal snickered, "Nice going ice queen." She joked, swinging her morning star again and taking down another pillar. Sapphire's hands balled into fists, "You...you're just too much." Sapphire huffed, pulling Steven onto the warp pad, "Maybe you're just not enough." Fire Opal commented as her morning star crashed into the wall of the pyramid, causing the structure to tilt slightly.

"Let's go Steven." Sapphire said. "What about Fire Opal?" Steven asked. "She can find her own way back." Sapphire said, having already foresaw Fire Opal returning to the temple herself. They warp pad activated, sending Sapphire and Steven home just moments before it was smashed to pieces by a huge boulder thrown off by Fire Opal's destruction.

* * *

Steven had gone from overexcited by Fire Opal's strength to one of being more excited by the thought of helping other get stronger. What's more, with Sapphire's help, he seemed to have gotten more interesting in learning strategic combat, which was good, as he was still having a hard time summoning his sword. Things seemed to be getting calmed down again, until Fire Opal returned.

Sapphire sensed her coming before she was actually within eyesight, and thanks to her size, she was within eyesight long before she reached the shore, stomping onto the beach much the same way a kaiju monster might have. "I'm bored!" She shouted, glaring down at Steven and Sapphire. "I see you're still fused, who could have seen that coming I wonder." Sapphire said in annoyance.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Fire Opal questioned. "Nothing Fire Opal, just please unfuse so we can be done this." Sapphire said, Fire Opal glaring, "What, you trying to get rid of me?" She questioned. "Not at all, but the mission is over, we don't need you to be fused any-" Sapphire stopped mid-sentence, jumping away and narrowly avoiding Fire Opal kicking her, "Don't need me huh? Maybe I don't need you!" Fire Opal shouted, swinging her giant morning star down at Sapphire. The morning star crashed into the sand, sending flames and sand in all directions.

Sapphire wasn't hit by the weapon, she had dodged it before it even came at her, but the force of the strike send her flying, and she crashed into the side of the cliff, where the fire and sand spray had hit her, leaving her laying on the ground in pain. Sapphire stood, "Listen to me, you're losing yourself in there. Unfuse, or I'll have to make you." Sapphire said, holding up her hands.

"What, you think you can take me?" Fire Opal questioned with a laugh. "You'll thank me later!" Sapphire said, sending a blast of ice at Fire Opal. The fusion gem stepped back, not liking the cold, but a swing of her morning star and the fire that came off it ended Sapphire's attack abruptly, as she needed to dodge it, and even then was hit by a kick from Fire Opal that sent her into the air.

"You think you're tough?" Fire Opal questioned, grabbing Sapphire in her hands, the heat from all the fire being too hot for Sapphire to freeze it, "You're nothing!" Fire Opal threw Sapphire down into the sand, sending a blast of fire from her morning star down on top of her.

Steven gasped in horror at the sight, and was revealed to see that Sapphire was still conscious, if extremely hurt. She was laying on top of a pile of glass, the sand having been heated by Fire Opal's attack. "I'm sorry Steven.." Sapphire said in defeat, "Even if I can see her attacks coming..I'm not strong enough to stop her...I'm too weak."

"No!" Steven shouted at Sapphire, "You're not weak Sapphire! I've seen you fight, I've seen you think, you can beat her! You're not as big as her, you're not as tough, but you're stronger, stronger in a different way! Show her what you showed me! Show her you're strong!"

Steven's words gave Sapphire a rush of courage, and she forced herself to her feet. She took note of the situation, focusing in on all the possible outcomes with her future vision. Seeing a future she liked much more than the ones where Fire Opal smashed her, she shouted, "I'm not done yet! What, can't you even beat a pipsqueak like me?" She questioned, getting Fire Opal more angry.

The fusion gem began to swing her morning star again as Sapphire towards the ocean, sending out a jet of ice in front of her to freeze the water she walked over, letting her run over top of the water. Fire Opal followed her, the water of the ocean steaming off of her body as she walked into it. When she swung her morning star, Sapphire's future vision let her dodge it, and her ice powers let her freeze the water that was send up at Fire Opal bu the morning star's collision with the water.

Fire Opal kept swinging, her morning star sending up large waves of water that Sapphire froze over. By the time Fire Opal realized it, she was trapped in a cave of ice. She attempted to smash her way free, but only succeeded in making the ice pillars land on her, making her poof in a cloud of red smoke. Moments later, Sapphire was dragging Opal and Ruby onto the shore.

"Are you guys okay?" Steven asked, worried. "Yes, Fire Opal just over worked our bodies. It kinds hurts, but we'll live." Opal grumbled. "Ugh, my head hurts." Ruby groaned in pain, "You were right Sapphire, never again."

"Yes, I was right wasn't I?" Sapphire said triumphantly. "And don't forget it."


	5. Chapter 5

**For the record, in the context of this story, the events of episodes not shown in these chapters have still happened. Things like Rose's room, meeting Connie, the Watermelon Steven's, etc did still happen, but aren't shown in this story because there wouldn't be much change to them in Switchverse, and then I'd just be writing out things that already exist in the show, which I find to be just the slightest bit redundant. Maybe I should have switched Steven and Connie as well...oh well, too late now. On with the chapter!**

* * *

The gems were on a mission into a deep cave of crystal filled catacombs. Supposedly, an ancient gem artifact was being hidden deep inside the tunnel, one that, like many of the others had been recently, had become active. The Crystal Gems didn't take very kindly to any gem artifacts being left active and out in the open, even if they were hidden away underground, and especially if they were weapons.

For once, they had even allowed Steven to come with them on the mission, which naturally had the quartz child several flavors of excited. Things were also kind of nerve racking unfortunately, as the caves weren't the most stable things in the world, and too much movement seemed to make every crystal shard forming above them shake. They would need to move carefully and quietly if they were to get through this unharmed.

So naturally, they were attacked by a giant worm monster that slithered through the caves and let out high pitched hisses. The worm creature had a mouth like a lamprey eel, just a hole full of teeth with several tendrils around it for grabbing and pulling things in. It rushed for Sapphire, changing course to Ruby when Sapphire fired an ice shard at it.

Ruby held it back with her gauntlet, punching the worm back. The impact of the worm against the cave wall caused the cave to shake, several crystal shards falling and smashing into the ground below, one of them nearly hitting Steven.

Opal noticed this, and acted fast, picking Steven up and placing him inside of a bubble. "What?" Steven questioned, "No, come on I want to help you guys!" He said, trying to get out of the bubble. Opal shook her head, "I'm sorry Steven, it's too dangerous here right now. We'll be back at the temple as soon as possible to get you." She said, tapping the bubble to send Steven back to the temple before she drew her bow to fire at the worm monster, crystal shards falling by the dozens now.

Steven appeared in the bubble room, looking around at the many other bubbles. Hundreds, thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands of bubbles filling the room, each one containing a gem from one of the many, many monsters the crystal gems had poofed in the past.

Steven sighed, crossing his arms in disappointment. "I could've helped.." He muttered to himself before he began trying to escape the bubble, frustrated. His annoyed, spurratic movements succeeded in popping the bubble, and only then did he realize the mistake in his logic. If a bubble that's floating high up in the air pops, then whatever's inside of it is going to fall.

Steven cried out as he began falling, not wanting to become a stain of the floor of the bubble room. He reached out, hoping he could grab one of the other bubbles to slow his fall. He managed to grab one, but was still falling fast towards the stone floor of the bubble room.

The bubble hit the ground, cushioning Steven's fall and causing him to bounce off of it as it popped, freeing the gemstone within. The gem was smooth and blue, and it looked familiar as Steven watched it rise up, a body of light forming around it.

Steven's eyes widened in surprise and curiosity as he saw that the body formed by the gemstone wasn't a monster. It started out looking like a person. He started to get closer, then jumped back fearfully when the arms of the body extended, stretching out in long tendrils as the mouth dropped down far too much, as though there was no jaw bone to keep it in place.

Steven scrambled to get back, cowering as the body grew larger and larger in front of him. He recognized this creature now, it was the Slinker, the monster that had taken all three of the gems to battle. He may have wanted to help the other gems fight, but he was smart enough to know that he'd never survive having to fight a gem monster all on his own, especially not this one.

Then, to his surprise, the body began to shrink down. The light faded, the light fading to show the Slinker's body. She looked like all of her drones had, the smaller versions of herself that were more annoying than they were actually harmful. This by itself was enough to intrigue Steven, and then he noticed that the Slinker didn't look hostile at all, just...afraid, shaking and looking back and form with the two small eyes on either side of her massive, plant-like mouth.

"Hey...it's okay, you don't need to freak out, nothing's gonna hurt you now." Steven said, attempting to move closer. The Slinker hissed, backing up and flailing her short tendrils like whips. Steven backed up, lowering to the ground and laying on his stomach with his arms and legs spread out, showing the Slinker that he meant no harm.

After a few moments, the Slinker began to calm down. "There you go, that's it, just relax and calm down." Stevan said, watching as the Slinker's tendrils retracted back to her body and her large mouth closed and curled back up like a closing flower.

Steven smiled, slowly getting up and moving closer to the Slinker, who didn't seem to be afraid of him anymore. The Slinker looked up at Steven, tilting her..Steven supposed it was a head, but it was really just the small mass where her giant mouth connected to her eyes and tendrils. Steven smiled, "I'm Steven. I didn't know you guys could actually be nice and stuff."

He reached down, the Slinker's jaw about to unfurl again until she realized that he was only petting her. She seems to appreciate this, and did not attack him. Things turned sour again, however, when the gems returned.

The moment the gems saw the Slinker free of her bubble, they summoned their weapons to fight her off, and the moment the Slinker saw the weapons, remembering them fighting, the creature panicked, hissing and unfurling her large jaw and tendrils.

"Steven, get over here where we can protect you!" Sapphire shouted, seeming confused when Steven not only didn't come over to her, but actually stood between the gems and the Slinker, holding out his arms as though to defend her. The Slinker went over to him, her tendrils locking around his leg the way a toddler might hold onto the leg of a parent.

Steven explained to the gems that the Slinker wasn't going to hurt them, that she was just afraid. Sapphire and Ruby tried to convince Opal to re-bubble it, but Opal couldn't say no to Steven when he was this sure that he could do some good. "I'll let you try to tame her, but you must be careful. Understood?" Opal said, Steven nodding as he hugged the Slinker.

Training the Slinker didn't go over so well. That is, it didn't go over well until Steven convinced the gems to put away their weapons and head inside the house. Sapphire would be able to sense it if anything were to go wrong, so they didn't have any reason not to agree to the plan other than their own paranoia, which Opal never let get in the way of things.

Once the gems left the Slinker be, Steven had her listening and doing things on command in less than a day, with the help of a discount brand of snack cookies that she seemed to love. Almost like a well trained pet, but Steven didn't really like to think of her like that, more like he was helping the Slinker learn not to be a monster anymore.

"She can even help you guys finish your mission in the crystal caves!" Steven said. "Absolutely not!" Sapphire said, though it was more on reflex than actually thought. "I don't see how else we're going to be able to get through the caverns without causing a cave in." Ruby said. "Agreed." Opal said, "Sapphire, unless you can predict more bad than good chances for this, we'll give the Slinker a chance."

Sapphire sighed in defeat. She didn't want to let this happen, but she also didn't have it in her to lie about her future vision. Within ten minutes, they were all back in the crystal caves, Slinker weaving gracefully through the caves and clearing up entrances without disrupting the cave at all, just like Steven said she could.

A trip that took half an hour to get to the mid-point before took fifteen minutes to get to the core of the cave, where a device that looked, to Steven, like nothing more than a stone ball with holes in it encased in a giant crystal.

"The Comet," Sapphire said, "An ancient gem weapon so powerful, so volatile, they had to seal it away deep underground and trap it within the crystals themselves to prevent it from wiping out an entire continent." "That thing could blow up the whole continent!?" Steven questioned.

Sapphire shook her head, "With how deep we are underground, if it went off, it would just destroy us, incinerate the caverns, and cause a medium level earthquake above." She said it like it was meant to be a comforting fact, but it made Steven back away from the giant crystal holding the death rock with Slinker holding onto him.

"Ruby, you'll need to use your gauntlet to get it out, but be careful, and don't touch it directly with your hand." Opal said, Ruby nodding and summoning her gauntlet. The Slinker tensed, seeing the gem weapon. "Is something wrong?" Steven asked, the Slinker beginning to shake, her jaws and tendrils unfurling again.

"What?" The gems turned to see what was happening, Opal summoning her bow when she saw that the Slinker looked about ready to attack. "Guys, it's okay, she's just nervous about the weapons." Steven said, trying to grab and pick up Slinker, though the tug to her tendril caused her to panic and snap at Steven.

"Sorry for pulling!" Steven apologized to the Slinker, but the gems had seen enough, and Opal fired. The arrow hit the Slinker and sent her flying across the cave where she crashed into a wall, causing the many crystal above to shake. "No!" Steven shouted, but Sapphire was already sending a blast of ice that kept the Slinker frozen long enough for Ruby to run up and punch the Slinker against the wall with her gauntlet, making the crystals above shake more.

The Slinker hissed, lashing Ruby with her tendrils and sending the small red gem into Sapphire, who flew back into Opal. all three gems crashed into the wall, causing a cracking sound from above.

Steven approached the Slinker, who was panicking and striking the ground in front of her. Steven moved closer, trying to calm her down, "It's okay, it's just me, I know you aren't a monster anymore," He told her, grabbing the Slinker and hugging her. In her state of panic, the Slinker bit down into Steven's shoulder. He flinched, but didn't let her go, "Please calm down..everything's okay."

The Slinker slowed, her tendrils and large jaw curling back up peacefully as she hugged Steven. "There you go, that's better." Steven said with a smile, before looking up in surprise when he heard the massive crystal shard above snap from the ceiling, disturbed by all the commotion. The crystal fell hard, nearly hitting Steven before the Slinker pushed him out of the way.

Opal caught Steven as he watched the crystal shard crash into the Slinker, poofing her and reverting her back to nothing more than a small blue gem. "Nooo!" Steven shouted, squirming out of Opal's arms and rushing to where the Slinker's gem was laying. He picked it up, his eyes watering.

"I'm sorry Steven," Opal said, "We were jumpy, and not ready to take the risk. You did well, your mother would be proud of you." "She...she would?" Steven asked, Opal nodding, "The truth is, Rose tried to help these creatures to, but she was never able to tame them. You were able to befriend the Slinker, which was more than she could. Maybe one day, you'll be able to help them in ways we couldn't have even imagined. But for now, it's time to send the Slinker back to the Bubble Room."

Steven nodded, a bubble forming around the Slinker's gem. Ruby and Sapphire gasped, though Opal just smiled. It was the first time Steven had ever made a gem bubble before. He tapped the top, sending it off. It appeared in the bubble room, right where it had been before Steven popped it the first time.

And a bubbled back of cookies appeared next to her moments after.


	6. Chapter 6

Connie sat waiting for Steven at the top of the hill. They had planned on having a picnic up there a few days prior, and both had been excited about it. Connie hadn't had a chance to talk to Steven between then and now, but was sure he would have told her if the picnic had been cancelled.

So naturally, she was a tad bit nervous when he was late. She was a bit neurotic to begin with, and with nothing around to distract her or keep her busy, she was finding it hard not to do what she usually did: panic. She'd been getting better about keeping it together since she met Steven though, and tried to keep it together awhile longer.

She let out a sigh of relief when she saw the large pink canine walking up the hill, recognizing it as Wolf. he was carrying Steven, who looked rather deflated, which confused Connie, as this was Steven they were talking about.

"Are you okay?" She asked as Steven got down off of Wolf and sat down across from her. "Yeah, just kinda lost track of time." He said, though the rings under his eyes said differently. "Are you sure? You look really, really tired."

"Okay, so I was all night training with my sword," Steven admitted, "I'm trying to get better about summoning it." "All night? Why?" Connie asked. It wasn't like Steven to obsess over his abilities, that was more her department, "Did something happen?" She asked.

Steven nodded, sighing, "Yes.." "What was it?" She asked, "Maybe I can help?" Steven shook his head, "It's not important, let's just eat." He said. Connie pouted, "Steven, please?" Steven frowned, "Come on Connie, that's cheating." He said, trying not to look directly at Connie's adorable pouty face for fear of melting.

In response, Connie pouted even more, knowing Steven absolutely couldn't handle it. "Okay, okay, you win." Steven said, Connie smiling, "It happened a few days ago…"

* * *

Steven and Ruby were sparring on the clifftop. Steven had summoned his sword and was using it to counter gauntlet attacks from Ruby. He didn't attack back, as the sword always put a little more power out than he thought it would, and he didn't want it to accidentally poof Ruby.

"Should we really be training so close to the edge?" Steven asked, blocking a punch. "No," Ruby said, "We should be training even closer to it, but you know how paranoid Sapphire gets about stuff like that."

"Well it is a little dangerous," Steven said, "One of us could fall off." Ruby grumbled, "Ugh, she's gotten to you to. Look, we're gems, and we're smart. We're not gonna fall off of some stupid cliff. Look." Ruby walked over until she was right at the edge of the cliff, turning around to face Steven, "Alright, come at me." She said.

"Are you sure? I've got a bad feeling about this." Steven said nervously. Ruby scoffed, "What? Have you got future vision now to? Don't worry, I'll be fine. Just a small one, I'll catch it no problem."

Steven nodded, walking over and slashing at her. Ruby had been right, she did in fact catch the blade of the sword. The force of the attack, though, broke her gauntlet and knocked her right over the edge. "Ruby!" Steven shouted down after her, already running down the hill.

Ruby face palmed, summoning her gauntlet again and grabbing the side of the mountain. By that point though, she was falling too fast, and it broke off again. Ruby glared as she saw the rock she was about to crash into, "Not gonna let some stupid rock get the better of me!"

Ruby landed fist first, punching the rock in two as she landed. Steven was panting by the time he got down to where she stood triumphantly between the two halves of the rock. "See? Nothing to iiiiiii…" Ruby's words were slurred as her entire body flashed and blinked, as though she were glitching.

"Okay, we might have a problem." She said, opening her palm and seeing that her gem had been cracked by the punch.

* * *

"I thought the gems just poff if they get hurt." Connie said. "When it's their bodies that get hurt, they go back into the gem to heal. It's easy because their bodies are made of light or something," Steven explained, "But if it's the gem...they can't heal that."

"So, what happens if the gem is cracked?" Connie asked.

* * *

"Nothing good." Opal told Steven as Sapphire scolded Ruby, "I told you this would happen if you kept messing around by the cliff top!" She said, seemingly torn between worry and anger.

"How do we heal her?" Steven asked. "In the past, we had Rose." Opal said, "She had a special power. She could put all the love she felt for us into a kiss to our gems, and any damage would heal."

"Mom had healing spit?" Steven asked, "In a sense, yes." Opal said. "Does that mean I do to?" He asked. "Actually, you very well might," Sapphire said, "It isn't likely, but not impossible. Only one way to find out."

Ruby held out her hand to Steven, who took her hand and kissed her gem. They all stared at the gem for several seconds, but the crack running along the center of it didn't heal. "Guess not." Ruby said, shrugging, "No biggie, let's just go to the Oasis and get me fixed up."

"Oasis?" Steven asked. "Rose could heal us, but if she were damaged, she wouldn't be able to heal herself," Sapphire said, "So I came up with an idea to have a place that was constantly flowing with the healing solution. Rose settled on making it an Oasis in the desert, that way any humans that got lost in the desert could find it and be healed enough by it to make their way out of the place. We've been careful not to get cracked ever since Rose left us, so we haven't had much need to go there, but now you'll finally have an opportunity to see it."

"Unless yours heals gems to, you don't need to start drooling," Ruby teased Sapphire, "Now let's go."

* * *

The gems appeared on a warp pad in the middle of the desert. At least, it should have been the desert. Steven could tell it was because of the sand below his feet, but there were significantly more cacti than there should have been giving the place the appearance of a very spiky forest.

"Oh not, the plants must have overgrown from Rose not being here to maintain the place." Sapphire said, "I knew this would happen. We should have been coming back here to keep the place in line. We-"

Sapphire's spiral was cut off by Ruby's body glitching out again, momentarily leaving her with her arms and legs at half their normal length and her face upside down. "We can deal with that later. Right now we need to get Ruby to the Oasis. Sapphire, which direction is the Oasis?" Opal asked.

Sapphire took a breath, "Okay, alright, everything is fine." Sapphire focused her future vision with her shades, "That way." She said, pointing north from the warp pad. Opal drew her bow, charged an arrow, and fired, blasting a massive wall of the cacti out of the way.

Sapphire flinched, "We probably couldn't found a way to get through without firing a bursting arrow into one of Rose's most sacred sanctuaries, but hey, it's alright!" Sapphire shouted with a smile that told Steven things were decidedly not alright.

Steven helped Ruby towards the hole in the cactus field Opal had made while she and Sapphire scouted ahead to blast another one into the next room. "You're gonna be okay, right Ruby?" Steven asked, Ruby nodding. "Yllatot edud, t'nod yrrow tuoba ti." Ruby replied, apparently unaware that her words were coming out backwards.

"You're getting worse.." Steven said, "I'm sorry I couldn't heal you.." Steven said again, "I should be able to do all the stuff that Mom did." Ruby frowned, "T'nod yas taht, er'ruoy taerg ydeadla."

Steven didn't understand what she'd said, but before he could ask, things got even worse. More cacti grew directly in front of them. These ones were bigger, and seemed to be moving, reaching over liked thorny hands to grab Steven and Ruby.

Steven summoned his sword, slashing at the cactus hand. It was knocked back, but not cut down, and reached over again along with two others. Steven slashed desperately at the many threats, trying to defend Ruby, who had tried to summon her gauntlet and simply collapsed as her legs gave out beneath her.

"I'm sorry.." Steven said, his eyes watering as the cacti closed in around him and Ruby. he closed his eyes, waiting his spiky end, but it never came. When he opened his eyes, the cacti were freezing over, Sapphire's ice powers stopping them and Opal's arrows shattering them.

Opal came over, picking up Ruby and forcefully throwing her into the sparkling Oasis. As more cacti hands sprouted, Ruby jumped out of the Oasis, her gauntlet on and her body enveloped in fire. The three gems fought off the cacti hands, and they escaped the Oasis safely.

* * *

"So Ruby's fine?" Connie asked, Steven nodding, "The Oasis healed up her gem. Opal's planning to have a fence set up to make sure no one falls of the cliff again and Sapphire is gonna work on getting the Oasis all fixed up. Apparently the Oasis's healing power didn't just keep the cacti healthy, they made them too powerful after so long, so those have to go." Steven said.

"So, if everything worked out, when what's wrong?" Connie asked. "I am." Steven sighed, "I should have been able to help Ruby. i should have been able to heal her, I should have at least been able to protect her when we were under attack. It was my fault she got hurt in the first place."

"Steven, she told you to attack her, it was her idea." Connie said. "But I still did it," Steven said, "And besides, what if the gems get hurt again and they can't get to the Oasis in time? What if they get to the Oasis but are too hurt to fight off the cactus monsters? I need to be able to help them, but I just..can't.." 

Steven's eyes started to tear up, and Connie brought him close, hugging him to try and make him feel better. "Steven, Steven it's okay. So you can't heal the gems, you do so much with them all the time. You've saved them all before, not to mention the times you've saved me."

Steven's tears fell onto Connie's face and onto the blanket below. "Sorry." Steven said, trying his eyes, "It's just hard you know? I want to make them proud, but I can't ever seem to be good enough." "Believe me, I know how that-ugh." Connie winced.

"What's wrong?" Steven asked, Connie moving back, "Not sure, something's wrong with my glasses," She said, taking them off and rubbing her eyes, a look of shock going over her face when she realized she could see.

"I..I can see without my glasses, how can I..what could've…" Connie and Steven's eyes widened when they realized the only thing that had gone anywhere near Connie's eyes were Steven's tears. Looking down, they saw a tear in the blanket, hit by one of Steven's tears, fix itself.

"I don't have healing kisses..I've got healing tears!" Steven shouted in excitement, "I've gotta go tell the gems!" Steven jumped up, stopping to hug Connie again, "Thank you Connie!" He said before running off towards the temple.


	7. Chapter 7

Steven was extremely bored. He had wanted to hang out with Connie today, but she was trapped within something called school. When Connie had first described it to her, there was a bit of a misunderstanding, and Steven nearly tried to help her escape it before she explained what was actually going on.

"It's not like an actual prison or anything, it's just where people go to learn stuff. Didn't you ever go to school?" Connie asked. "Whenever I need to learn something, the gems always tell me about it." Steven said, "Hm..maybe I can do that today."

"If you want, but it'll probably be boring." Connie warned. "I'm bored already." Steven reminded her, "Worst case scenario I'm just bored in a different location. Talk to you later." He said, heading to talk to the gems.

He found Sapphire first, telling her about Connie's school and how he wanted to try learning some things as well. Sapphire gracefully sidestepped the question of why they'd never taken Steven to any kind of school, and instead of answering that question, simply sat him down and asked him what he'd liked to know about.

Steven thought for a moment, "Well...I guess I'd really just like to learn more about gem stuff. You guys usually only tell me about gem stuff when it's happening, I'd kinda like to know about stuff before it's trying to kill us."

Sapphire chuckled, "Well, I suppose it is only fair that you have some method of learning more about your culture. Wait here." Sapphire said, heading off into the temple and returning some time later with what looked like a hand mirror, but with a more metallic surface.

"This is a gem powered artifact, it can record and display again anything it's seen throughout all of gem history." Sapphire said, handing Steven the mirror, "There hasn't been much need for us to use it, we already know about gems. I'm sure it'll…" Sapphire paused, the way she always did when she was getting a sense that something was wrong.

"What is it? Did you just see the future?" Steven asked curiously. Sapphire shook her head, "Never mind it, far too unlikely," Sapphire said, as she'd been trying to get better at not overreacting to her future vision, "Right now, you just need to focus on seeing the past. Ask the mirror any question you've got about gems and it'll answer."

Sapphire left the room, wanting to discuss her new, rather unsettling vision with Opal and Ruby so they could plan just in case it did come true. Steven looked at the reflective mirror surface, "Hm...can you show me when gems came to earth?" He asked.

The mirror face changed, no longer reflecting Steven's face, and instead showing a ship in space. No, tons of ships, and entire fleet, and how they landed on earth. Steven didn't recognize where they were landing, but he figured it was somewhere from a long, long time ago.

"Cool, can you show me a really strong looking gem monster?" The image shifted again, reflecting a silhouette of Opal. "No, a gem monster, not just a super strong gem." Steven chuckled, but the mirror remained on the image of Opal.

"Maybe it's busted..I should probably go tell Sapphire about it.." "No." The mirror replied, reflecting Steven saying it from seconds before. Steven blinked, confused by this. "What?" He asked, "No. No-show-earth-gems."

"Are you...talking to me?" Steven questioned. "Right." The mirror parotid Sapphire's words. "And you don't want to talk to the gems?" "Right." "Why not?" Steven asked. "Never mind it-can show-you-any." The mirror replied.

"Woah.. you're like a person." Steven said. "Right." The mirror replied.

* * *

Connie got out of school and joined Steven in talking to the mirror some time later. It didn't seem to have any problem talking to her, but whenever Steven suggested they go talk to the gems, the mirror seemed to freak out.

"No, no, no!" The mirror repeated, though by this point Steven and Connie were set on showing them, and took the mirror to the temple, where Opal, Ruby, and Sapphire were talking. Well, more that Sapphire was talking and Ruby was trying not to jump out of a nearby window because of it.

"Hey guys, what are you up to?" Ruby asked, hoping to stop Sapphire's future vision rambling if only for a little bit. "We've been talking to the mirror you gave Steven." Connie said. "It's really fun, you didn't tell me it was like a person."

Steven did not expect the reaction he got from the gems. All three of them looked horrified the moment he said this. They looked to one another nervously, then back to Steven and Connie, "What...do you mean by that?" Opal questioned.

"Like, it can stitch together different things it saw to talk to people. Its really nice and funny, but I guess it's never seen a corrupted gem before, and it doesn't seem to know very much about you guys." He said.

"It shouldn't be able to do that, it should just be following whatever orders it's given." Sapphire said. "I don't like this." Opal said, standing up, "That thing could be dangerous, let's bubble it for now and look into it later."

"What? Why?" Connie questioned. "No!" The mirror shouted. "See? You're scaring it." Steven said, "It doesn't want to be bubbled." Opal came closer to them, "It's just a mirror, a tool, it can't want anything, now give it here." She said, reaching out to take it.

In a panic, Steven slapped Opal's hand away. Sapphire and Ruby gasped, and Steven and Connie frantically fled the temple, hurrying down the stairs and hiding near the fence with the mirror.

"What's their problem with this mirror?" Connie questioned. "I don't know," Steven said, turning to the mirror, "Please, they want to bubble you away, how can we help you?"

"Gem powered-not a-tool. Lllet, meeee, ouuuuut." The mirror displayed an image of itself, then showed it turning, and zoomed in on the cracked, green, triangular gem lodged in the back of it. It showed a silhouette of Steven and Connie pulling it out, then a flash of light.

"Steven!" The shouts of the gems could be heard, they were getting closer. Steven and Connie nodded to each other, turning the mirror around and trying to pull it free. It was really wedged into the mirror, and took several seconds of trying to pry the thing free.

When it was out, the mirror shattered, and the gem rose from their hands, a body forming around it like when Sapphire had reformed. She was short, just below Steven's height, with a green uniform and a yellow diamond shaped insignia in the middle. She had yellow-green hair that seemed to form a triangle. Her cracked gem was on her forehead, and when she opened her eyes, Steven and Connie found that they were reflective like mirrors.

"Thank you.." She said, stumbling slightly, as though it had been a long time since she'd last used her feet, and didn't quite remember how to use them. "You..you actually helped me..you freed me.."

Steven and Connie caught her before she fell on her face, "It's Steven..right? And Connie?" She asked, Steven and Connie nodding, "My name is Peridot. Are you..are you really a Crystal Gem?" She asked.

"Yep!" Steven said proudly, though this seemed to confuse Peridot, "But then..why are you being nice?" "What do you mean?" Connie questioned, but before Peridot could answer, the other reached them.

Opal already had her bow out, Ruby had her gauntlets and Sapphire's hands glowed with her ice powers. "Wait stop!" Steven shouted, trying to calm them down.

"You…" Peridot glared, "You three knew I was in there, and you didn't do anything!" The fence behind them rose from its post, twisting until it a large pillar of metal, "Did you even wonder who I used to be!?"

The pillar slammed down onto the gems, who just barely managed to hold it up and stop it from crushing them with all three of them working lifting together. "I'm Peridot! And you aren't going to keep me prisoner here anymore!"

Peridot turned to Steven and Connie, who looked afraid and confused, "They aren't going to let us leave." "Leave?" Steven questioned, "Where else is there for us to go?" "Home." Peridot answered.

Steven and Connie looked at each other, unsure of what to do. Peridot frowned, realizing they weren't coming with her. "Don't trust them Steven. Goodbye."

The gems managed to throw the metal pillar off, only for a movement of Peridot's hands to make the metal spin around them like a hurricane made of little metal chips. When it subsided, Peridot was gone.

"Was that...was that another gem?" Steven questioned. Sapphire sighed, "Yes, it was." "You two are grounded." Opal said.


	8. Chapter 8

"Why are we grounded?" Steven questioned. "Why? You really need to ask?" Sapphire questioned. "You let a dangerous gem out into the world," Opal said, "And what's worse, you didn't do as you were told. That's more than bad enough for two groundings."

"You can't ground Connie though," Steven pointed out. "Oh yes we can," Sapphire said, "We called her parents." Connie's head fell in defeat. "Come on guys, ease up on them," Ruby said, "They didn't know what was going on."

Before further argument could be had, Greg entered the house, "Uh, guys..you might wanna see this." They all went outside, gasping when they saw it. Funland seemed to have vanished completely from the town, but it wasn't hard to figure out where it had gone. A little ways off from the town, there was a massive metal pillar stretching up into the sky. More bits of metal were flying up towards it from various houses and buildings every few moments and attaching to the pilliar to make it bigger.

"You!" The mayor, likely out of desperation for something to pin it on, pointed to the gems, "It's those three magical ladies, they'll know what's going on here!" Opal sighed as a crowd began to form around them, all wanting an explanation.

"It's Peridot." Steven said, "A gem that I accidentally let out. She can control metal, and now it looks like she's trying to steal as much of it as she can." "So it's your fault!" Someone in the crowd shouted, going silent when Ruby raised her gauntlet.

"No, they're right," Steven said, "It is my fault." Connie shook her head, "It's my fault to, I helped you free her. This is our responsibility." Steven nodded, "We have to go and stop her from whatever she's doing with all that metal."

Connie nodded in agreement, taking Steven's hand. "You're crazy if you think we aren't going with you." Ruby said, Opal and Sapphire nodding. "I'm coming to," Greg said, "You'll need a ride out to that thing, and I've been meaning to see what you guys' missions are like."

Wolf placed his paw on Steven's head, the pink canine's way of letting them know that he was in as well. Steven smiled, he had them to help him out. "You ready for this?" He asked Connie. She nodded, "Ready."

Connie and Stevon climbed on top of Wolf's back and headed off towards the tower. Greg and the gems followed in Greg's van, Opal riding on top of it, Ruby napping in the back, and Sapphire riding shotgun.

"What's the plan when we actually get to Peridot?" Connie asked. "I'm hoping we can stop her without things turning violent. Gems shouldn't be be fighting each other." Steven said, noticing Sapphire seem to wince at the statement.

"What's wrong?" Steven asked her. "Well Steven.. you see.." Sapphire sighed, "We're always fighting gems to be honest." "Wait, what?" Steven questioned. He didn't recall any other gems until Peridot.

"Not all gems are good Steven." Sapphire said. "All those monsters we fight used to be normal gems, just like us," Ruby said, poking her head forward, "Right Sapphire?" She asked. Sapphire nodded, "Yes. they become corrupted and broken in the mind. Their bodies change to match their madness, and they become the monsters we fight. That's why we call them the corrupted gems."

Steven took a moment to let that particular chestnut digest before asking, "Is that what's wrong with Peridot? Is she corrupting?" Sapphire shook her head, "No, it'd be easier if she were. All a cracked gem will do is weaken the gem's power until they shatter and cease to be; the fact that she's remained not only intact, but still has this much control over her metal powers is incredible. I couldn't have predicted it. No, I'm afraid she's just the normal kind of corrupt; she's a bad gem that needs to be dealt with."

Steven wasn't so sure about that, but before he could say so, they reached the tower. It was a massive structure, and barely looked like it could support itself. "Woah...Peridot?" Steven called up at the tower. There was silence for a moment, before the tower resonated with Peridot's voice, "Go away! I want to be alone."

"Peridot, please, we don't want to fight you. Can't we just talk about this? I don't think you're a bad gem, I want to help you!" Steven shouted up to her. "No! You can't help me. Crystal Gems don't help anything. Just leave me alone." Peridot said.

Steven got off of Wolf and went over to the tower, hitting it lightly, like he was knocking on a door, "Please Peridot! We can't leave until you give all this metal back!" He shouted only for a hand to jut out from the metal tower and lift him up. A body of metal stepped away from the tower; a golem shaped to look like Steven that spoke with Peridot's voice. "I said, leave me alone!"

The metal Steven threw him, Connie jumping off of Wolf and catching him as Wolf stepped forward to defend them. They landed on the ground hard, but safer than they would have. Wolf growled, and the gems stepped forward with him. Out of the metal tower, metal versions of Opal, Sapphire, and Ruby formed, standing with the metal Steven.

The gems summoned their weapons, the metal gems all doing the same. "Stand together," Opal said, looking to Sapphire and Ruby, "Don't let them separate-" before Opal could finish, she was blasted back by an arrow from her metal double.

Opal stood, cracking her neck and returning fire with her light arrows. Metal Opal fired just as fast, their arrows colliding mid-way between them and sending small shockwaves out with each collision.

The stalemate was momentarily broken when Opal jumped up, dodging the metal Opal's attack while she charged up a shatter arrow. When she fired it, it split into several dozens of arrows, counting all the metal Opal's arrows and allowing Opal to tackle her, pinning the metal golem down and breaking it's head off with a direct shot from her bow.

Opal sighed, only for the metal double to lift her up and throw her across the field as its head reformed, the metal all flying back into place.

Ruby, meanwhile, was locked in a slug match with her double, both with their gauntlet on and both countering every punch they took. Ruby's body became engulfed in flame, and she noticed that the metal clone was starting to have a harder time countering her punches, her arms being pushed back more with each shot.

Ruby smirked, "What? Can't take the heat?" She questioned, the flame around her growing and enveloping them both as Ruby punched her clone again, watching it drop to the ground in a puddle of melted metal. She punched the air with her fist in victory, only for a hand of liquid metal to reach up from the puddle and throw her into a nearby boulder.

Ruby groaned as the rock cracked from the force she'd been thrown with. "As long as we're playing fair," She picked up the two halves of the rock, engulfing them in fire and throwing the makeshift meteors at the clone, charging in herself afterwards.

Elsewhere, Sapphire was locked in a draw. Every shard of ice she threw was countered with a shard of jagged metal. Every blast of cold she sent was countered with a blast of liquid metal. They were evenly matched in power, and Sapphire was willing to bet her clone could take more punishment than she could.

What Sapphire did have the clone didn't was her future vision. She focused her shades, isolated the future that was most preferable, or trying to as she had to skate away from harm while she did so, freezing the ground beneath her as she went. When she found it, she fired a sequence of ice shards, followed by a cold blast.

The Sapphire countered them all, but didn't account for Sapphire herself, who skated directly into her with a rush of cold that froze the clone over, causing it to shatter into two pieces. Sapphire smiled, only to frown again when the two half stood back up, metal flying from the tower to reform the missing halves, forming two separate Sapphire clones.

Wolf was not having very much luck with the Steven clone. Wolf was sure that the clone would just fall apart if it were hit with a roar, but it's body moved across the field without even needing to touch the ground, letting it dodge every roar and counter with a punch that send Wolf flying back.

"Wolf!" Steven and Connie shouted, turning to Steven's clone and running at it angrily, throwing rocks and shouting to get its attention. The metal clone glared, its metal arms stretching out and grabbing Steven and Connie by the throats, lifting them into the air.

They struggled uselessly for a few moments, until Greg smashed into the metal Steven clone with his van. "Is this a normal magical mission for you?" Greg questioned as Steven and Connie got back to their feet, "Because I'm not sure how comfortable I am with you going on these anym-"

He was cut off when the metal clone lifted his van and threw him, causing him to crash next to Wolf. He staggered out of the van with a broken leg, groaning in pain.

Steven turned to face his metal double with a glare. "Peridot, I don't want to fight you." He said, the clone Steven's arm shifting into a blade as he rushed towards Steven, who stood his ground. "I said, I don't want to fight!" His sword appeared in his hands as he said this, countering the clone's blade and vibrating because of the collision. The sound was loud and piercing, and caused the four metal clones to shake, rattle, and fall to pieces.

Steven's sword vanished again and he walked over to the tower. "Peridot, please let me come talk to you." He said quietly, sure she could still hear him. A metal hand formed out of the tower, grabbing Steven and lifting him up.

Steven was shocked by how high up the tower went, very nearly leaving the atmosphere altogether. Peridot sat at the top of the tower, sitting with her legs to her chin and her arms curled between them. She was scared.

"What are you doing here." Peridot questioned. "What am I doing here?" Steven shook his head, "What are you doing with all this metal?"

Peridot sighed, "I just want to go home." Steven walked over to Peridot, "I understand how important home can be, but this metal, it's an important part of my home, and you took it away." He said.

"I'm only using all his earth metal because my gem is cracked." She said, pointing to deep crack in the triangular gem in her forehead, "If I can just gather enough of it, if I can just stack it high enough…" Peridot shook her head, "It's never going to work, is it?"

"I don't think it is." Steven said, "Wait...I can help you." Steven said, "I have healing powers, I think I can fix your gem." He said. "Healing powers?" Peridot looked up at him with a skeptical expression. Steven nodded, tilting his head forward and drawing out any and all sad memories he could.

He only managed to muster up a few tears, but even just one would have done. The tears landed on Peridot's gem, and it began to glow as the crack sealed itself. Peridot felt her gem, gasping. She held out her hands, and small chunks of metal began to bend and twist, the color changing as the metal itself shifted its properties, becoming something new.

The metal locked around Peridot like armor, forming longer arms and legs. She opened her eyes, and they were normal again, no longer mirrors. "Thank you Steven!" She said, standing up, though she was much taller than him down, and hugging him. "No prob Bob."

"It's Peridot actually." She corrected, looking up at the sky, "Goodbye." She said, taking off towards the stars. Steven smiled, until the metal tower beneath him began to shake and rumble. Without Peridot's powers holding it together, it began to collapse under its own weight, and soon Steven felt himself falling an unsettling distance towards the ground.

Before he could hit the ground though, Connie grabbed his hand, having ridden Wolf through one of his warp roars to rescue him. They warped back to the others, Steven forming a bubble around everyone to protect from the shower of metal.

It wasn't pretty, there'd be a lot of work involved to get all the metal back to its proper place, but no one was hurt. Connie, Steven, and Ruby saw this as reason enough to celebrate, but Opal and Sapphire looked up at the sky, grim.

"She made it off planet." Sapphire said, "She's headed to Homeworld." "What does this mean for us?" Opal asked. Sapphire shook her head, "Far too soon to tell. All we can do is wait and see.."


	9. Chapter 9

**Before I start this, let me apologize for how long it took me to get back to writing for this. You see, I was conflicted. My original plan was to do the Switchverse chapter for Fusion Cuisine or Warp Tour first, as they are the important episodes that come before this one, but I couldn't bring myself to actually write them, because there aren't enough actual changes made to the episode to justify writing it.**

 **I've decided to skip them. They still happened in the Switchverse continuity, but the only other episodes for season 1 I'll be doing are The Test, On the Run, Marble Madness, and the finale of The Return and Jailbreak. Let me know in the reviews what episodes you'd like to see for season 2.**

* * *

Steven and the gyms were stuck inside while it rained. Opal didn't mind the rain so much, and Ruby seemed to enjoy heating herself up and watching rain droplets steam off of her, but Sapphire predicted lightning if either of them went out.

Seeing that the gyms were going to be bored while stuck inside, Steven went to get a bored game for them all to play. When he opened the closet however, he saw something that caused him to frown, looking down sadly.

"Something wrong Steven?" Ruby asked, Steven taking out the Moon Goddess Statue, "It's just.. seeing this statue.. It's like a reminder of how badly things went at the Lunar Sea Spire because of me."

"Oh Steven, it wasn't nearly that bad." Sapphire said. "Yes it was." Steven said, "that was the first time you guys gave me a chance on a real mission to show that I was ready to start doing gem stuff, and instead, everything went wrong because of me."

"It's fine Steven, really." Opal said. She didn't see Sapphire subtly shaking her head, as the blue gem had seen what would happen if she continued speaking, "That mission wasn't really that important anyway, if it had been, we wouldn't have used it to test you."

"Test me?" Steven asked, Sapphire facepalming, "Steven, hen the Lunar Sea Spire mission came up, it wasn't very important, minimum threat level if even that. We'd been waiting for something like that so we could take you along on a mission and see how you would do. So yes, in a sense, we took you there to test you."

"And I failed the test…" Steven said, the color draining from his face. "No, no! Everything worked out in the end," Opal said, "That's gotta be at least a passing grade." "Not to mention all the times you've helped us out since then," Sapphire added, "We can count that as extra credit. You more than passed."

"No, no that doesn't count." Steven said, "I need to pass the test the right way." "Well, maybe we could give you a new test." Ruby suggested. "Yes, that's a great idea!" Steven sad, looking to Sapphire and Opal. They looked hesitant for a moment, but Opal answered, "I supposed it would be the best way to see how far you've come since then. Alright Steven, get ready; it's time for another test."

* * *

A day had passed, and the test was ready. "We've modified the inside of the temple to act as our testing ground," Sapphire said, "Inside are three rooms, each one designed by one of the three of us." "To pass, make it all the way through; if you can." Opal said with a smile. "We'll be waiting for you on the other side."

Steven nodded, taking a deep breath, "I can do this." He said, more to himself than to any of the gems as he stepped forward. "Good luck man," Ruby said, "You're gonna need it~" She added with a smirk that put Steven a little on edge, though he supposed that was the point.

Steven walked down the dark hallway behind the door, and stepped out into a room glowing bright red with the lava dripping down the walls, the heat radiating from them and hitting Steven like a punch in the face. "Must be Ruby's room."

Steven walked forward, jumping aside to avoid dripping lava and bursts of fire from floor. He passed by a slope that connected the floor to the ceiling of the room. He wondered for a moment if he was supposed to go up it, until the molten hot boulder, at least four times Steven's size, rolled down it.

Steven took off running, actually managing to keep ahead of the flaming boulder. He reached the edge of the platform, and jumped over the pit of lava between it and the door. The rock stopped at edge. It had been so close to Steven he had been able to feel the heat of it on his neck before he had jumped.

He sighed in relief, and stepped forward into the next room. The room went from bright and hot to dull and cold as he passed into what he figured was Sapphire's room. The room was full of ice blocks, and stepping onto them caused him to slide across the floor to the other side, missing the stairs.

He saw several platforms of ice, and after a bit of inspection, he found the tile that would send him sliding to the stairs so he could get off of the ice and climb his way out of the room and into the next one.

Opal's room was full of towers with water pouring down from them like fountains. When Steven stepped forward, large ballista rose from the top of them and fired down at him. Steven ducked away, narrowly avoiding the massive arrows.

Steven found that the arrows didn't shoot him if he hid in the water of the towers, so he held his breath and edged along across to the other side before darting from it and running. He made it from one tower to the next, avoiding the arrows, which seemed to get bigger, sharper, and faster with every tower.

He could see the door. Just one more hard sprint and Steven would prove himself. He jumped from the water, running forward towards the door. He had thought he would be able to make it to the door before the ballista fired at him, but he'd been wrong. The arrow fired...and missed.

Steven had locked up in fear when he realized that the arrow stopped short, hitting the ground in front of him. "What..?" Steven stood up, watching the ballista fire again, hitting next to him. He hadn't moved at all, but the ballista hadn't hurt him. "No..they didn't.."

Steven walked back through the room, not dodging for moving from a straight, predictable path, but the arrows missed every time. In Sapphire's room, he found that every ice tile he chose would send him to the stairs. In Ruby's room, the lava pit had some kind of barrier over it, making it impossible to fall down, and the molten boulder stopped right before it would hit him.

Frustrated, Steven moved forward, the boulder pushing back to avoid him. He chased it back up the slope, and accidentally passed through the top of the room. He found himself on top of a row of three cubes, the three rooms, floating in a avoid. He looked to the end of it, where the gems would be waiting for him.

Glaring, he walked forward. 'Make it through if you can.' 'Good luck, you're gonna need it.' Thinking of what the gems said now made his even angrier. They'd basically been taunting him. They'd known he would win; they'd made it impossible for him to use.

He walked over, seeing the three gems standing at the end of the 'test'. He realized they were talking, and stayed quiet so he could hear what they were saying.

"What's taking him?" Ruby questioned, "You don't think he could've gotten hurt do you?" "It isn't possible for him to get hurt," Sapphire said, "well, technically it is, if the test rooms collapse in on themselves or if the temple itself falls under attack, but we'd have noticed something like that long before Steven got hurt." Steven couldn't help but marvel at how tunnel visioned Sapphire was in spite of her power.

"We just need to be patient, he'll get through, and everything will be fine." Opal said. There was a pause, then Ruby sighed, "Okay, no one else is gonna say it, so I will. We're bad at this, aren't we?"

"What? No, we.. we aren't bad at it. Just..still figuring it out." Sapphire said. "Yeah, and we've been still figuring it out for thirteen years. Even for gems that's slow," Ruby said, "Rose would know what to do." "Of course she would." Sapphire said, specks of frost forming on her dress as she did.

"Enough of that," Opal said, "This isn't about us. We need to keep Steven in the green. We know he's strong, he's summoned Rose's sword more than once, but he seems to be forgetting that. We may not be good at it, but we have to try. Steven needs this."

'No,' Steven realized, 'They need this.' And with that, Steven knew exactly what needed to happen. He walked back across the blocks, back into the testing room. He didn't run to avoid any traps, didn't put anything into dodging the fire or the boulder, into solving the ice block puzzle or into avoiding the ballista. He just kept walking. Nothing hurt him, nothing even really tried to, and he reached the end of the testing room, where the gems started to cheer and congratulate him as though he had just survived a challenging task.

And Steven played along. He questioned how they'd been able to put together such a trying test, recounted the adventure of how he had gotten through it, and never made any mention of what he had seen or heard above the testing area.

* * *

 **I considered for awhile having the tests be real, as Switchverse is all about switching things up, but I felt that kinda took away from the point of the episode.**


	10. Chapter 10

Steven sat on the couch, reading the most recent book he had gotten from Connie; having gotten into the habit of getting a new one from her every time he finished one. Currently he was on the series of books called the No Home Boys, and was enjoying them, wondering what it would be like to set out on his own adventure across the world.

His daydream was interrupted by by the gems appearing on the warp pad, returning home from the Galaxy Warp. Ruby was holding several of the orb bots they had seen the homeworld gem Jasper leave behind for unknown reasons. Sapphire was only holding two, and Opal had let her large arms split into four arms to hold four times the amount of them that Ruby held.

"Are those all from the warp?" Steven asked. He hadn't seen nearly this many of them the first time around. "Unfortunately, yes." Sapphire said with a sigh, "They just keep sending more, and unless I'm seeing wrong, they're going to send even mo-Ruby don't you dare." She said.

Ruby had her gauntlet out, and had been about to crush one of the robots between her hands, "Aw come on, why not?" Ruby questioned. "We need to study these things and figure out what they are, what they do, and why they are being sent to earth. We can't do that if they're smashed." Sapphire said, Opal nodding in agreement.

"Yeah, but we've got like a thousand of them already, what's one of them getting smashed? I just wanted to show Steven, he'd think it's awesome. You just don't wanna get your stupid dress all dirty." Ruby said. Sapphire frowned, "That isn't the least bit-"

Ruby smashed her hands together, the bot exploding in her hands and sending a spray of light blue fluid with the consistency of toothpaste all over herself, Steven, Opal, and Sapphire. Only Sapphire seemed to mind, but she minded enough for all four of them, "That was remarkably unnecessary and extremely immature." She said. She wasn't shouting, just speaking slightly louder than normal as ice crystals covered her dress, which for Sapphire was kind of a big deal.

"Why can't get just get rid of all this Homeworld stuff?" Ruby questioned. "We need it for information. We cannot risk a repeat of the horrors they brought on last time." Sapphire said, her tone quieter again, but more serious with it.

"What actually happened last time?" Steven asked. Sapphire turned to Opal, who nodded, "He may as well know at least something." Opal said before going to put away the robots she was carrying. Sapphire sighed and turned to Steven, "Steven… a long time ago.. The gems came to this planet and did something terrible to the planet. They brought with them nothing but devastation and left behind nothing but damage and pain. Right Ruby?" Sapphire said, turning to Ruby.

Ruby's expression changed when Sapphire asked this, losing her usual humor and becoming more serious, than Steven had ever seen her, even in a fight, "Yeah," She said, though her voice was lined with bitterness, "Nothing but damage."

Sapphire nodded, "We're trying to make sure they don't do it again. That's why we have to make sure these machines get preserved and studied, not smashed for the sake of a joke. So would you please refrain from being so reckless?"

"Yeah, sure, whatever." Ruby said, sounding deflated as she flopped down onto the couch. Sapphire paused, likely checking her future vision to see how likely it was that Ruby was telling the truth. She smiled, "Very good." she said before heading the same direction as Opal.

Steven looked at Ruby, who now seemed to have gone from her normal energetic self to being oddly sullen. "Are you okay?" He asked. Ruby sighed, "I'm okay Steven, I just.. You ever feel like you're somewhere when everyone else wished you weren't?"

"Nope," Steven said, "But the No Home Boys feel that way all the time." Steven said. "The who?" Ruby questioned. Steven held up the book, and began explaining the No Home Boys to Ruby. "Huh.. well.. What do they do when they feel like everyone wants them to just go away?"

"Well, they just go away," Steven said, " 'If we ain't wanted here, no sense stickin' 'round and seein' what kinda nastiness they spit up next to try and get us gone. Might as well leave now so they know we did it ourselves and not 'cause of nothin' they did.' " Steven said, quoting the book in as best an accent as he could produce, which was still of relatively low caliber.

Ruby thought about this, "Yeah… they're right." She said. "Of course they are, that's how the whole story starts." Steven said. "Steven, wanna run away like the No Home Boys do?" Ruby asked. Steven, not fully understanding Ruby's implication, nodded with an excited smile, "Let's go!"

* * *

 _"It's time for us to get movin', time for us to have some fun,"_ Steven packed a small amount of supplies, not really expecting them to be gone for very long, whereas Ruby packed up enough supplies to survive in the wilderness unsupported for a month, _"There's no time to hand around now our adventure's just begun."_

They boarded Yellowtail's fishing boat and sailed off across the water, _"We'll be thinkin' about our friends while we chase the setting sun,"_ Yellowtail dropped them off on another section of land, where they got on a bus and kept going, _"Because we're leaving them behind; we're on the run."_

The bus dropped them off, and they managed to get on a train just before it took off, _"We're on the run," "I don't care what all the other's say," "We're on the run", "Though I guyess there are still things that just never go away," "We're on the run," "I wish I could say that there's place I'd rather be than home,"_

 _"But home is not a place I've ever known. That's why we're on the run."_

Steven sat next to Ruby, both looking out at the passing terrain. "So.. ready to stop pretending to be a No Home Boy?" He asked. Ruby shook her head, "Nope." She said, just staring out at the sunset. Steven tapped the floor of the train car boredly for a few minutes before saying, "I bet Sapphire and Opal are starting to miss us back at the temple."

"That's not my home." Ruby said, seeming irritated. "What? But..on, that's right, you guys are from Homeworld." Steven said, but this made Ruby glare, "That's not my home either!" She shouted. Steven, confused, asked, "Then..where is your home?"

Ruby paused, then turned to him with a smile, "I'll show you."

* * *

Ruby showed Steven to a hot, dusty ravine in the desert made of red sandstone. It looked barren, dead, lifeless aside from the streaks of red running through the rock. Ruby smiled, seeming happy to be there, "Welcome to the Kindergarten!"

"Kindergarten?" Steven questioned, looking up at the high stone walls. "Uh huh, this is where I'm from." Ruby said as they walked inside. Steven looked up at the tall, metal machine lining the walls that looked like giant virus cells.

"I thought all the gems came from space." Steven said, unsettled by the place. "Opal and Sapphire did," Ruby said as she walked through the dust, "But I was made here on earth, like you." She said, "Look, see that," She pointed to a hole in the wall, looking uncomfortably exact to Ruby's size and shape, "It's my hole."

"You're..hole?" Steven asked. Ruby nodded, "I was inside the hole for awhile, and then *pop* right out of this hole." Steven took a step back, "Okay..what about the other holes?" He asked, worried by the possible hundreds lining the stone walls.

"Relax man, it's f-" Ruby was cut off by the sound of the warp pad, Sapphire appearing on it. Her expression was always rather neutral, but there was a bitterness to it now as she saw Ruby and Steven. Ruby sighed as Sapphire walked over to them, "Great, the fun police are here."

"I saw the probability of you bringing him here, Opal asked me to check it out just to be sure. I didn't want to believe it," Sapphire said, "How on earth could you bring him here?" She questioned. "I don't know, we were in the neighborhood." Ruby said, arms folded.

"Sapphire, did Ruby really come from here?" Steven questioned. Sapphire sighed, "Steven, a long time ago, a lot of things happened that we didn't want you to know about." "Oh, what, don't think he's ready?" Ruby questioned, "Think he shouldn't know how those bad gems made bad places to make more bad gems?"

"Ruby." Sapphire said, almost as a threat, "No, you know what, he deserves to know that the reason you all started fighting in the first place was to protect the world from parasites like me!" Ruby shouted before looking away.

Sapphire turned to Steven, "Steven, I'm sorry you had to see any of this, we never wanted to come back here." She said. Ruby's teeth grit, "Then why don't you just leave!?" She shouted. Without missing a beat, she stepped forward, reeling back and throwing a punch at Sapphire, her gauntlet and fire surrounding her fist before it connected and sent Sapphire spiralling into the stone wall.

Steven's eyes widened at this. Sapphire always at least tried to dodge away from attacks, as she always saw them coming. She must not have believed that, even under these circumstances, that Ruby would have actually gone for it.

Her expression was still stone when she stood though. She lifted her hand, summoning her shades to her face, "Ruby, don't do this, I don't want to fight you." She said. "I wouldn't want to fight me either!" Ruby shouted, throwing fire ball at Sapphire before running towards her.

Sapphire send a blast of cold energy, nullifying the fire ball and throwing up a cloud of mist that Ruby jumped through. Sapphire gracefully sidestepped the flaming punch that Ruby sent at the ground, as well as the flurry of blows that followed. Now that Sapphire was expecting it, she could predict and avoid, her feet freezing the ground beneath her to essentially let her ice skate away.

She hit Ruby with a freezing kick to gut that sent her flying. She hit one of the metal machine legs hard, and was belted with ice balls from Sapphire as she approached. "Ruby, stop this, you can't beat me." She said calmly.

This only infuriated Ruby more, "I don't care!" She shouted, her body erupting in so much fire and heat that the metal behind her started to melt as she rushed Sapphire. Sapphire looked for a way to dodge, but even at her fastest, she wouldn't avoid the area being attacked all at once by fire and heat, and was send rolling across the ground by a gauntlet punch.

Ruby walked over to Sapphire, her flames starting to die down, "I never asked for it to be this way you know, I never asked to be made for Homeworld." Her gauntlet faded, "I never asked to be made at all!"

"Ruby.." Sapphire said, only now realizing what this fight had actually been about. "Guys, stop fighting!" Steven shouted, running over to this, practically in tears from seeing two of his surrogate parent figures physically attacking each other, "You shouldn't fight like this." He said.

Before anyone could say anything, Sapphire reacted. Her future vision allowed her to see the machine above them falling, knocked down by the damage done to its leg during the fight. Before it could even happen, Sapphire dove to Steven, who reacted instinctively; forming a bubble around them both.

A bubble that didn't quite reach Ruby.

Ruby, panicked, ran the other way as the machine fell, obscuring Steven and Sapphire's view of what happened to her. Sapphire used her ice powers to blast the rubble off of them, and they looked for Ruby, finding her huddled up inside of her hole in the wall. Steven pointed inside, giving Sapphire the stern look he usually got from Opal.

Unable to argue, Sapphire couched and went into the hole. "Ruby, are you.. Do you think me and Opal hate you?" She asked it calmly, and in a way, that was the problem. "Don't pretend, I know exactly how you feel about me," Ruby said, "You go on and on about how bad the old gems were, how great it is that they're all gone now, about how everything they were, everything they did, everything they made is wrong and terrible. I know they made me, I already know I'm wrong, I don't need you reminding me."

Sapphire was shocked, which was a shock to everyone else. Sapphire got surprised on occasion whenever something she'd assumed from her predictions was wrong, but it was a truly rare sight to see Sapphire shocked. "Ruby.. I had no idea.."

"What?" Ruby questioned, "You, the future seer, the one who brings it up more than anyone else so I never forget it, had no idea?" "I just.. I never thought of all of this as you," Sapphire said, gesturing to the Kindergarten, "I never even tried predicting it, I didn't think it was possible that you'd think you were apart of something so horrible.. You're the singular good thing that happened here, I thought.. I thought you knew that..so much for my future vision.."

Ruby just stared at Sapphire for a few moments after she said this, the truth of the situation hitting her like a ton of bricks. She moved forward, hugging the blue gem. Sapphire hugged her back, and Steven smiled as they exited the hole.

"Alright, now let's go home so I can sleep in a bed!"


	11. Chapter 11

Steven and Connie sat on the beach together, discussing books that they'd both read and enjoyed. Steven agreed to read Connie's favorite book series, The Unfamiliar Familiar, if she read the old gem texts that Steven had been catching up on. He described them as being like the world's best series of comic books, but even better because it all actually happened thousands of years ago.

They exchanged the first books of their respective series, but couldn't start reading yet. They were interrupted by a loud thud as something smashed into the ground. Steven recognized from experience that it was something dense hitting the beach from very high up, and ran after it, telling Connie to stay put.

Naturally Connie followed him, and they both arrived in time to see the gems battling an orange robot. It was about the size of a car, the front of it shaped like a sledge hammer with four similar shaped legs beneath it to hold it up.

Opal fired a shatter shot of arrows to stun it long enough for Sapphire to get in close and freeze it all the way through. Ruby finished the job with a flaming gauntlet punch that shattered the whole machine.

"Another one?" Steven asked as he and Connie went over to the gems. "You've seen one these robots before?" Connie asked. Steven nodded, "They've been showing up ever since we jaw that gem at the Galaxy Warp." He explained to Connie.

"Jasper," Sapphire said, "We don't know what she's sending them for, but I can clearly see her putting them together." "Is that really all you can see?" Ruby questioned. Sapphire adjusted her shades, "I also see another one coming. Now." She said.

Opal drew her bow again, charging it up as she waited. The light and heat coming off of the arrow grew as she held it and the power behind it became greater. She let it loose the moment the next robot landed, destroying it on impact with the super arrow. It exploded, orange metal raining down around where it had been.

"That's like the sixth one we've had to destroy," Ruby said, "I'm getting tired of this." "Maybe we could follow one?" Steven suggested. "What do you mean?" Opal asked. "The bots are always trying to go somewhere before we show up to smash them. They're clearly being sent for a reason, and we know it isn't to destroy us because Jasper doesn't know about us. Maybe if we follow one to wherever it's trying to go, we can figure out what they're for and stop it there." Steven explained.

Opal thought about this, "Sapphire, can you see and end to these machines if we follow one to its location?" Sapphire went quiet for a moment, then nodded, "It's extremely likely that they'll stop coming if we follow Steven's idea, and equally likely that they'll just keep coming with greater and greater numbers if we don't."

"Are we sure we really want to follow one?" Ruby asked, extremely hesitant about Homeworld technology, "Not at all," Opal said, "But we want even less to spend the rest of our lives fighting them off five times a day. We have enough to deal with at our normal missions without Homeworld mucking things up further than they already have."

Ruby nodded, "I guess you're right." She admitted begrudgingly. "Alright, now all we have to do is wait for another one to show up and we can-" Steven hadn't even finished his sentence when another orange bot smashed into the ground in roughly the exact same location as the last, getting up and beginning to move.

Opal picked up Ruby, Sapphire, Steven, and Connie and jumped up onto the orange bot, sitting down cross-legged on top of it with the others around her as they rode it to its destination; the machine not seeming to notice their presence.

The machine went inside the temple, but only it seemed to get to the nearest warp pad to it could teleport. It appeared on the warp pad in the Kindergarten, confusing its riders even further as they looked around.

"What is this place?" Connie asked. "A long time ago, a lot of bad gems did a lot of bad things," Steven explained, "And this is where they did a lot of it." "Whatever it's here to do, it can't be good." Sapphire placed her hands on the machine to begin freezing it, but Opal stopped her, "Not yet. She'll just send another."

Sapphire sighed, taking her hands off of it and continuing to let the machine move. It reached what looked like a cave dug into one of the tall orange walls. Some ways down inside of it, there appeared to be some sort of laboratory, though it looked run down and rotting beneath the dust of the valley above it.

The gems and Connie climbed off of the machine as it began to charge forward, smashing into a circuit unit as though to destroy it, but the effect it had was quite the opposite. The energy fueling the machine flowed out of it and into the system, restarting it. A massive screen on the wall blared to life with the orange gem, Jasper, appearing on it.

"What a dump." She said to herself, Opal grabbing the others and pulling them out of view, "Guess if anyone could get this thing running it would be me." She chuckled, pressing a few buttons and causing several more similar machines to be dispensed from the wall, these ones seeming more versatile as they began to put the lab back together.

"We finally have a chance to ask her what she's doing." Steven said. "This is no time to ask questions." Sapphire said, seeing that a battle of the end result of that action, "this is the perfect time to ask questions!" Connie agreed with Steven, scrambling up into view with him, "Hello." They greeted.

Jasper stared at Steven and Connie for a moment, "There appears to be some sort of infestation." "We're just humans." Connie offered, "So, what are you doing with all this old alien stuff?"

"Human infestation." She said dismissively, four of the machines turning to them in order to 'disinfect' the area. In a panic, Steven summoned his sword and cut through the closest one, Opal blasting away a second with her bow while Sapphire and Ruby fired ice and fire to destroy the last two.

"Gems!?" Jasper questioned, "What are gems doing here!?" "We're the Crystal Gems!" Opal shouted, "We never left, and we're still here! And if you want to get back at this planet, you'll have to go through us!" Opal fired a scatter shot arrow at the screen, giving Jasper just enough time to shout, "I'm reporting this!" Before the screen was destroyed.

"That could have gone better." Connie said. "Guess it wasn't a great idea to come here after all." Steven said, looking down. "Well, I don't foresee anymore of those machines coming to earth," Sapphire said, though the ground at her feet became covered in ice as she said, "But I fear Homeworld gems may be coming in person.."


	12. Chapter 12

**Because of how little would actually be changed in the first part of the episode, I'll only be covering the end of the Return and I'll be combining with Jailbreak to save time. Two for one, enjoy! Also a quick disclaimer: I do not care if you do or do not ship Pearlmethyst, personally I don't. It's presence here is out of necessity for the story, just as Ruby and Sapphire are in the canon show.**

* * *

Steven stepped off of Wolf, seeing Opal standing on the beach with her bow drawn, the arrow in it charged up so much he could feel the heat coming off of it from here. Instead of Ruby and Sapphire, Garnet stood next to her, static crackling around her fists as she too charged up a powerful attack.

Together, the gems attacked, Garnet's lighting wrapping around the charged power arrow and flying at the incoming hand shaped ship. The attack, devastating though it would have been towards almost anything the gems had gone up against on earth, did nothing at all to the ship.

"At least Steven will be safe." Opal said, seemingly having resigned to her fate. "Guys!" Steven called, running over to them. "What!?" The shock of seeing Steven there in such an immediately dangerous situation caused Garnet to separate into Ruby and Sapphire. "What are you doing here!?"

"I'm going to help you!" Steven said, "I-" His words were cut off by the handship landing. Out of it came three gems. The first two they recognized as the Jasper who'd been sending golem droids at them, and Peridot, though she appeared to be more of a prisoner at the moment. The third of them though, was a slender blue gem that seemed frighteningly powerful in spite of her smaller form to the Jasper.

"This is it?" She questioned as she looked over the Crystal Gems. "Lapis," Jasper complained, "They keep busting up my machines, what am I supposed to do?" "Just blast them with the ship," Lapis said, "You don't need me for this."

Jasper sighed, pressing a button and causing the ship to charge up a blast. "Steven, run!" Opal shouted at Steven. "No! I'm not gonna just leave and let you all get hurt!" "I won't let you risk your life!" Opal shouted, reaching for him, likely to bubble and send him away as she had before.

Steven stepped away, "No, I can help! I.." He turned to the ship as it fired at them, his gem glowing, "I'm a Crystal Gem to!" He shouted as the blast collided with him, throwing up a cloud of smoke.

But the blast hadn't hit them. Steven's sword had cut clean through it without even making contact, and the blast had hit on either side of the gems. Lapis' eyes widened when she saw the blade, "That sword...that human, he has the powers of Rose Quartz!"

"Now do you believe I needed help!?" Jasper questioned. "Fire again, scatter shot!" Lapis ordered, revealing her own gem weapon; wings made out of water that sprouted from her back. She jumped into the air as the ship rapidly fired a barrage of smaller blasts.

Steven counter another blast, but the amount of them coming made it impossible to do much more than evade. Lapis landed on the ground in front of him, "Why do you look like this Rose?" She questioned, "Why are you so weak?"

Steven didn't know how to answer that, and before he had to, one of Opal's arrows hit, knocking Lapis back towards the edge of the water. "Steven, run!" She shouted, running passed him and firing scatter arrow.

Lapis' wings surrounded her in a bubble of water, guarding her against the arrows. With a movement of her hand, a hand and arm formed out of the water, flowing into the shape and mimicking the movement of Lapis' hand.

The giant hand smashed down on top of Opal, grabbing her and reeling her in towards Lapis as the blue gem took out a small device that resembled a sharp tuning fork throwing sparks. She drive the points of it into Opal's gut.

There was a rush of buzzing static and then a cracking sound. Opal stumbled back away from Lapis, lines of energy trailing across her body from a split in the center of it. Her leg seemed to break off, causing Sapphire to gasp. Then, all at once, Opal was gone. There was a poof like when the corrupted gems were beaten, but her gem.. There were two of them on the ground.

Steven was so shocked and confused, he didn't realize that Lapis had turned her attention to him until her water wings were already around his head, cutting off his breathing.

"I don't know what your plan was here Rose, but look: you army is scattered, your base is taken. It's okay. You've failed." That was the last thing Steven heard clearly, as the lack of oxygen caused him to pass out.

* * *

Steven was aware of the cold metal below him before anything else. He opened his eyes and found that he was inside a room, like a jail cell made of green metal. Instead of bars though, there was a sheet of that energy Lapis' device had had.

Steven was afraid to touch it after what had happened to Opal. Opal… her gem.. It had been in two pieces. Was she.. Could she be.. N-no, he could hear her gem with his tears if he could just get to her. It was this knowledge that drove him to try and push through the sheet of energy.

He was surprised to find that it had no effect on him, likely out of his being only half the species it was specifically meant to contain. "Gotta find the others." He said, turning on his heels and heading down the hall.

A few cells passed his though, he found another one that wasn't empty. Inside was another gem, but not one Steven had seen before. She was small and purple, with long white hair. Her clothes looked quite normal for earth in modern times, which was a but surprising. Her gem was visible at the top of her chest.

"Uh..hi?" Steven said, the gem jumping in surprise and scrambling to the back of her cell, "G-go away!" She shouted, sounding more afraid than angry. "It's fine, my name is Steven, I can help you get out of here."

The purple gem looked down in shame, "What would be the point? We failed, we-" She paused when she heard something. Singing. Far off, and hard to listen to, but quite clearly singing. Her expression changed immediately, "Pearl.. You've gotta get me out of here, I have to find Pearl!"

Steven nodded, stepping into the field and blocking the flow of energy for the short purple to walk out under him, "We'll find out friends, don't worry." He said. Amethyst didn't seem to care at the moment about helping Steven find his friends, and instead took off in the direction she'd heard the singing.

Steven tried to keep up with her, but she was too fast and the halls too confusing. He ended up losing sight of her and getting lost. As he looked, Steven found a familiar green gem waiting in a cell, "Peridot!"

She was sitting against the wall, her knees drawn up to her chin and her legs wrapped around them. "Leave Steven. Just.. just leave." She said. "What? Come on, I can help you out of here." Steven said, reaching for the cell.

"No! There's no use fighting Homeworld Steven. They always win. If we don't try, they might at least go easy on us. Just leave me alone." Peridot said. Steven didn't know what could have happened to make her fear Homeworld so much, but he didn't want to know. He left to go find the purple gem again.

Instead, he found the point where all the singing was coming from.

Unfortunately, Lapis and Jasper were right there as well, and Steven had to hide behind the corner of the hall to avoid them. "Stop singing!" Lapis hissed, her wings slapping the wall next to the singing gem's cell. "Set a course for Homeworld." She told Jasper.

"What about the Cluster? It was the whole reason we came here in the first place." Jasper said. "Rose Quartz takes priority!" Lapis said, heading down the hallway. Jasper sighed, walking off in the other direction, muttering to herself.

Steven waited until he couldn't hear her footsteps anymore, and turned the corner to see the gem, who'd started singing again. She was tall and thin, with pale white skin, an old fashioned looking dress, and short, light pink hair that stuck up like a ponytail in zero gravity. Her gem was visible on her forehead. There was something.. Familiar about it.

"Hey," Steven said, "I like your song. Want me to help you out of here?" He asked. She smiled, "Thank you Steven." She said as Steven blocked the field, "Wait, how do you know my-" "Pearl!" The purple gem's voice echoed down the hall.

The gem, Pearl, took Steven's hand and rushed off through the halls, stopping when she saw the short purple gem down the next corridor. "Pearl!" "Amethyst!" The two gems ran at each other, Pearl dropping down practically to a kneel to embrace Amethyst, holding her close.

"Did they hurt you?" Amethyst questioned, "No, I'm fine, did they hurt you?" Pearl questioned back, "Who cares!" Amethyst said happily, tears welling in her eyes, "I do!" Pearl said. Laughing at this, Amethyst leaned in and kissed the taller gem, who returned the affection.

Steven wondered if he should really be watching this, but before he turned away to give them privacy, their bodies began to glow and they merged together, fusing into… Opal. "Opal?!" Steven questioned, "You're a fusion!?"

Opal sighed, "I'm sorry Steven, we didn't want you to meet us like this." "Well..did I make a good first impression?" Steven asked with a smile. Opal snickered, "Oh Steven, we already love you." She said.

"Where is she!?" The voice of Lapis was distance, but the anger in it was clear. "Go get the others." Opal said, "Amethyst did a lot of running around before she found Pearl. Ruby and Sapphire are down the east hall, and the control room down the north. Go."

"Are you sure you can beat her alone?" Steven asked. "Don't worry Steven," Opal smiled, "I'm never alone." Steven nodded, heading off down the hall as Lapis entered from across the room.

"Oh great, you're both out? And you're fused again? Why? I've seen what you really are." Lapis said, wings out and gem destabilizer in hand. Opal chuckled in amusement, "No you haven't."

 _"This is Opal, back together, and I'm never going back down at the hands of the likes of you, because I'm so much better. And both sides of me are saying go get her."_ Opal and Lapis began to circle each other like wolves about to attack.

 _"The two of us aren't gonna follow your rules, so come on and bring ALL of your fancy tools. Let's go, just me and you. Let's go, just one on two!"_ Lapis rushed forward, trying to hit Opal with the destabilizer, but the fusion moved elegantly, jumping and dodging and avoiding her strikes. She leapt back, pulling out two weapons; the weapons of her component gems, a whip from the Amethyst gem and a spear from the Pearl gem.

 _"Go ahead and try to hit me if you're able, but you know that our relationship is stable. I see you hate the way I intermingle, but I think you're just mad that you're single!"_ Opal sent Lapis back with a strike from her spear, sending her back. Opal's whip then wrapped around her leg, letting her fling the blue gem into the wall.

 _"You aren't gonna stop what we've made together, we are gonna stay like this forever,"_ Opal used the whip to grab the destabilizer, pulling to her and smashing it with the spear before jumping back to avoid a flying tackle from Lapis.

 _"Try to break us apart and we'll come back newer, and we'll always be twice the gem that you are!"_ Opal put the whip and spear together, summoning her bow and arrow. She began firing at Lapis, who managed to avoid the first few shots by by flying, but was blasted into the air by a shatter shot.

 _"I am made, o-o-o-o-of, Lo-o-o-o-ove, lo-o-o-o-ve."_ Lapis flew down from the ceiling, her wings wrapping around her body like a shield to block the arrows as she crashed into Opal and began forcing her through the floor into the engine room below.

 _"This is who we are, this is who I am. If you want to get passed me, you'll have to try again."_ Opal stood up again to face Lapis, damaged from the attack, but seemingly unfazed despite it.

 _"Because I am a feeling, and I will never end. I won't let you hurt my planet, and I won't let you hurt my friends!"_ Opal summoned her bow again, jumping back to avoid a rush of water Lapis pulled from the pipes of the engine room.

 _"Go ahead and try to hit me if you're able, but you see that my relationship is stable."_ Opal fired burst arrows, causing the water the scatter for other arrows to fire through and knock Lapis back.

 _"I see you think I'm not something you're afraid of, 'cause you think you've seen what I'm made of."_ Opal swung her bow, hitting Lapis with it and knocking her to the front of the engine, a large powerful machine with energy flying off of it. Lapis tried to back off of it, but Opal was keeping her pinned down with arrow fire as she got closer.

 _"But I am even more than the two of them, everything they care about is what I am. I am their fury, I am their patience, I am their inspiration."_ Opal fired a scatter arrow that pushed Lapis into the engine, causing it to overheat and explode. Opal jumped up to the room above and began running down the hall, _"I am made o-o-o-o-of, l-o-o-o-ove, l-o-o-o-ove, and it's stronger than you."_

Opal made it to the control room, where Steven, Ruby and Sapphire were already waiting. "Jasper got away with an escaped." Ruby said. "This ship is going down." Opal said. "What about Peridot?" Steven questioned. "There's no time!" Opal said.

The hand-shaped ship descended from the sky, landing next to the crystal gem temple. The crash itself did a number on the ship, but then the feedback loop of energy in the engine caused the whole thing to explode, blasting it apart.

The crystal gems had hidden themselves inside one of Steven's bubbles, which Sapphire covered with ice for extra protection. Even with this guarding them, the explosion still blasted through their defenses and damaged then all, but they were all still alive.

"Everyone..okay?" Steven asked. Ruby gave a grumble, and Sapphire sat up. Opal had landed on her feet, though the collapsed immediately after. She was still in one piece though, so everything was good.

Or at least, it was until the rubble of the ship shifted and Lapis pulled herself free. She was weakened, but she hadn't been poofed. What's more, unlike the gems, she still had enough power for her water control; and what with them being right next to the ocean..

But Lapis couldn't tell on sight how weakened the gems were by the crash, and didn't want to risk attacking. "Thi..this isn't over. You only beat me because you're a fusion. If I had someone to.."

Before Lapis could finish the sentence, the rubble shifted again and Peridot, badly damaged by alive, pulled herself free. She tried to levitate away with the metal parts of the ship when Lapis grabbed her and pulled her down, "Peridot, fuse with me!"

"What!?" Peridot questioned. "Think about how long they kept you trapped here on this garbage planet. This might be your one chance to take revenge. Please, just say yes." Lapis said. "Peridot.. No.." Steven said meekly.

Peridot's indecisive expression hardened, and she offered her hand to Lapis, who smiled and pulled her in to dance. Ruby tried to rush forward to prevent them from synchronizing, but it happened too fast, and the gems merged together.

The resulting gem was taller than Opal, with sharp, liquid metal wings sprouting from her back. Four eyes, but other than that no extra parts. She actually looked quite pretty, the green and blue of the two gems coming together nicely. But the malicious intent of the fusion was clear.

That is, until the liquid metal wings wrapped around the fusion's body, solidifying into a sort of straightjacket. "What?" She questioned as metal from the ship flew at her, binding her body in several layers of metal.

Water reached from the ocean, but rather than try freeing her, it connected to the metal like chains and began pulling her towards the ocean. "I'm done being a prisoner to everyone," Peridot's voice said through the fusion, "Now you're my prisoner. And I'm never letting you go!"

The fusion was dragged underwater and out of sight, leaving the crystal gems staring out over the water.


	13. Chapter 13

Steven and Connie rushed into the temple, finding Sapphire and rushing to her. Sapphire turned around to greet them before they'd approached her, and already had round wooden practice shield in her hands. "I know, I foresaw," Sapphire said when Steven and Connie attempted to explain themselves, "You wish to learn how to use a shield so you can help fight alongside Steven should combat become unavoidable."

"Well, yeah!" Connie says, "We kinda figured you would need some convincing before you agreed to it though." Steven admitted. Sapphire chuckled, "Normally I would have, but I looked and saw that every version of time where I disagree, you manage to convince me using only words. I'm not sure how or why, but if it is inevitable, there isn't much use in fighting it. Come, we'll begin the training at the Sea Spire."

They nodded, all going to the warp pad and teleporting to the Sea Spire. Sapphire gave Connie the wooden shield and summoned a copy of herself made out of ice. It took far too much effort to be useful in a combat scenario, but it could be useful for training scenarios such as this. The Sapphire clone was armed with a sword. "This ice sapphire will be your opponent. Allow me to show you the proper movements for using the shield."

"Remember, _you do it for him, and you would do it again," She helped Connie hold the shield properly, blocking a basic strike from the ice sapphire's sword, "You do it for her-eh, that is to say, you do it for him." Steven and Connie were confused by the mention of a 'her', but figured that Sapphire had just misspoken somehow._

 _"Keep your, stance strong, keeps your arms braced." Sapphire inspected Connie's form as a more skilled ice sapphire reeled back to strike her, "As you're blocking a strong blow, balance is the key." Connie took the strike, and pushed the ice sapphire back with her shield, forcing her back across the spire, "Right foot, left foot, now charge even faster, and as you're pushing forward, keep your eyes on me."_

 _"Keep my, stance strong." Connie said to herself, "Good." Sapphire nodded. "Keep my arms braced." "Right." "And as I'm blocking the blow-" "Concentrate, don't you want him to live!?" "Left foot, right foot," "Yes but now to put your whole body into it! Everything you have, everything you are, you've got to give, on the battlefield. When everything is chaos, and you've got nothing but the way you feel, your strategy and a shield, you just think about the life you'll have together after the enemy yields! And then you do it for her, that's how you know that you'll win. You do it for her! That is to say... you do it for him."_

 _"Deep down, you know, that you weren't built for fighting. But that doesn't mean you're not prepared to try! What they don't know, is your real advantage. When you live for someone, you're prepared to die." "Deep down, I know, that I'm just a human." "True." "But I know that I can draw my blaster and fight!" "With my brief existence," "Good." "I can make a difference." "Yes excellent!" "I can be there for him, I can be his knight."_

 _"I can do it for him!" "You do it for her. Okay now do that again," "Yes Ma'am." "I did it for her, and now you say," "I'll do it for him."_

* * *

It was going on two weeks now that Sapphire had been training Connie diligently in shield use and defensive combat. Every day they went to the Sea Spire to train, even if Steven couldn't go with them during it. Steven was starting to get a little nervous by their training though, as Sapphire's instructions to Steven were starting to get a little... questionable, he felt like.

"I understand that being a one with the shield, she would have to be the one to block the attacks, and would need to be the one putting herself in front of attacks," Steven explained to Opal and Ruby, "But I'm pretty sure Sapphire was telling her to get in front of attacks even if she didn't have her shield on her, and I don't think she could really handle attacks like that."

Opal sighed, "Oh not this again." "Again? What do you mean?" Steven questioned. "Back during the war, Sapphire took her job of protecting Rose to an.. extreme degree. As a Sapphire it was her job to foresee and prevent damage from occurring to whoever was in charge, but Sapphire.. she didn't seem to care about protecting herself, just keeping Rose safe, even if she got poofed by gems she didn't have a hope of stopping."

Steven went silent at this, getting a mental picture of Sapphire just throwing herself in front of a giant axe and getting poofed. Then his eyes widened as he pictured Connie jumping in front of a similar weapon, and he bolted off to the warp pad. He needed to talk to Connie and Sapphire about all of this before the fortune telling gem told Connie something terrible.

Steven arrived at the Sea Spire just in time to hear Sapphire tell Connie, "Just remember Connie, when a battle starts, your life ceases to matter. Only Steven's is worth protecting. Understand?" Connie nodded, "Yes Ma'am." She says, raising the large pink shield that had once been used by Rose Quartz. She'd barely been able to life it at the start of the training, but now could wield it properly.

"Stop!" Steven ran down, cutting through one of the many ice sapphires with his sword, "No, that isn't true." Steven said, "Your life is always going to matter, I'm not gonna let you believe that it isn't." Connie blocked three strikes from three ice sapphires, and Steven cut them all down with the sword, "Wow, this is much easier." "That's the idea." Steven said.

"No, this isn't how this happens." Sapphire said, frost forming on her dress, "You aren't supposed to stop Connie from learning how to defend you." "I'm not," Steven said, "I'm stopping her from thinking she isn't important when she's one of the best people I know." Connie smiled, and Sapphire's expression didn't change, though she seemed confused by this.

"I.. may have made an error somewhere.." She said, "I'm just not sure where.." "I think I know where you can start looking," Steven said, "Did Rose make you feel like you were nothing?" The frost melted from her dress as she shook her head, "Rose made all of us feel like we were everything.."


	14. Chapter 14

Inspired by Connie's recent shield training, Steven was spending more time in the beach with his sword, training with her. It was an odd way to bond Steven was sure, but they enjoyed the time spent together. When Connie had to leave for the day, Steven went inside and found the gems seemingly preparing for a mission of some kind. "What's going on?" He asked them curiously.

"It's Jasper," Sapphire said, "I've had a vision of her, I know where she's going to be." "Really? Where?" Steven asked. "I've foreseen her at the Kindergarten. I haven't any doubts at all that she'll be there." Sapphire said. "But.. why would she go to the Kindergarten?" Steven asked. "I have not been able to see why she is there, but if she's going to such a place, there are only a few possible reasons." The blue gem said gravely.

"It's very possible that she's going to attempt to turn on the injectors." Opal said. "Injectors? What are those?" Steven questioned. "You've already seen them, at least while they were deactivated," Sapphire said, freezing a bit of the air to form a small sculptor of the injector drills Steven had seen at the Kindergarten, "If Jasper restarts the Kindergarten, the machines will pick back up right where they left off. They will tunnel into the earth, injecting gems who will absorb the energy and life force out of the planet in order to take shape. Slowly, the planet will.."

There was a pause. Sapphire likely sensed Ruby's distress at all the talk of the Kindergarten and didn't want to push the topic much further for fear of her outburst. For Steven's sake, Opal said, "It'll rot the earth Steven, from the inside out. We aren't going to let that happen though. Right gems?" Ruby and Sapphire nodded in agreement. "Good, now Crystal Gems, to the warp pad." Opal said, stepping onto the warp pad with Ruby and Sapphire.

Steven sighed, turning to head outside. Maybe he could get a little solo practice in with his sword while the gems were gone. "Aren't you coming Steven?" Opal said, "I said, Crystal Gems to the warp pad." She smiled at Steven's excited reaction to this as he rushed over to the warp pad with them, patting his head as they teleported, appearing on the warp pad on the dark, unsettling valley of the Kindergarten.

They got down off of the warp and began looking around for signs of Jasper or activated machines. The place looked awful, but then it always did. the place was lifeless and dead, but none of the machines were active. Steven stopped to look up at the massive gem injector drill that was perched precariously on the cliff side above him, only for Sapphire to shout to him, "Steven, behind you!"

If the warning had been in real time, Steven would have been flattened. As Sapphire had started warning him before Jasper's attack had even started, Steven was able to turn and raise his sword in time to block the helmet rush from the large quartz gem. Steven was knocked back by several feet, but he was alive and in one piece. Balls of ice and fire shot at Jasper, followed by a hail of light arrows.

"Gah, I don't have to deal with this, I already got what I needed." Jasper grunted, turning and bolting off in the other direction. Ruby and Sapphire took off after her, not wanting to let her escape. Steven tried to follow, but Opal grabbed him and held him back, "Opal come on, she's getting away!" He said frantically. Opal calmed him and said, "Think about it. If her mission was to restart the Kindergarten, then the injectors would be on. They're all still off."

Steven looked around, seeing that she was right. "Oh yeah.. what was she doing here?" "Let's find out." Opal said, putting him down and walking over to the entrance that lead to the Kindergarten's inner lab. Opal pried it open by herself, holding onto Steven as she began to gracefully work her way down the path into the lab. "Wow, you're brains and brawn. Is the strong part of you Amethyst and the wise part of you Pearl?" Steven asked.

"Sort of. When you fuse, the result is a whole greater than the sum of it's parts. Amethyst could gain all of Pearl's wisdom, and Pearl could gain all of Amethyst's strength, but they still wouldn't be me." Opal said. "That's why you're so great?" Steven asked as they reached the lab. "Yes." Opal said with a smile that melted away as she began looking over the lab. Instead of being empty save for machinery, there were several odd clumps of dirt inside. They didn't look like they'd fallen from the ceiling, they seemed compacted, formed intentionally for some reason.

"What are these?" Opal reached out to touch the biggest of them, but when she did, it began to shudder and shake. Opal stepped back in surprise, and many small dirt clumps began to fall from the ceiling. When they did the ground, there was a flash of light like a gem forming, but a gem was not the result. The result was body parts. Arms, hands, fingers, feet, teeth, eyes, legs; any type of body part a gem could have. They formed but without bodies or heads, connected together in odd angles. A leg that ended in a hand with an eye at the palm, a torso with a mouth in center and an arm for a tongue. They were horrifying.

Opal reacted fast, poofing the first few with her bow. When she saw what they were though, she began to panic. When she poofed the strange creatures, she saw that they weren't any kind of corrupted gems, they were the shards of gems, fused together physically so they would form together. Steven found this horrific just by implication, but Opal...

Opal was back up against the wall, her bow vanishing. "These were Crystal Gems.. they were broken to pieces, they were buried together, forced together..." She said, mumbling more to herself than to Steven. Finally, the big dirt heap in the middle of the room opened up, taking form. It looked almost like a spider, but without eyes. The legs ended in feet and hands, and there was a massive, fanged mouth in the center of the palm that made up the torso.

It began to crawl towards Opal, intent on doing who knew what, Steven had already summoned his sword and had been poofing the smaller ones, but now rushed over, getting between Opal and the big gem amalgamate. It began to strike and thrash against the bubble Steven formed. "Opal, you've gotta help me!" Steven said. "I-I'm sorry.." Opal's body began to glow white, her body beginning to separate as the trauma of what she was seeing forced her to unfuse.

The amalgamate broke threw the bubble, smashing Steven's sword away. Seeing Steven in danger let Opal pull herself together, if not completely. She forced the creature back with Pearl's spear, binding it in Amethyst's whip and constricting it tighter and tighter until it poofed. Opal let both weapons vanish as she dropped to her knees, panting. "Opal..?" Steven asked. "Poof and bubble all of them." Opal ordered, "Do not let any of them get out of here."


	15. Chapter 15

Steven was getting worried. He and the Crystal Gems had had no luck finding the rogue Homeworld gem Jasper, having lost track of her after seeing her at the Kindergarten. Being the large brutish thing that she was, it was easy to see where she had been, but actually finding where she was proved more difficult. Sapphire's future vision, when focused with her shades, could give a snapshot of where she was in that moment, but by the time they had figured out where that was and gotten there, Jasper was gone and something was broken. Sometimes she even left traps just to spite them, such as when she had set up one of her armored drones to attack them when they got to the old gem ship she had been scavenging.

They had defeated the drone without much hassle. It didn't have nearly the power of Jasper herself and no real intelligent, so Opal's arrows brought it down quick. They kept the machine for possible use later, but at the moment it was inactive and useless, and Jasper was still out there. It was getting infuriating always being behind her, and frightening not knowing where she planned to go next.

But she was starting to get desperate, and sloppy for it. Steven discovered this one day when he was taking a break from the search, not wanting to run himself ragged. He turned on the TV, only to find static at first, and then Jasper's face on the screen. "This is Jasper, facet 1, reporting in all on possible frequencies from Earth Pyramid Coliseum. My informant and the leader of the mission are gone. The ship has been destroyed. I am stranded on this planet with the Crystal Gym rebels still on the loose. I can fend them off without question, but if I'm here when it happens, not even I could survive. Please send help!"

Sapphire was able to sense that no gems other than themselves had gotten this message, but they would need to shut it down quickly. With the warp to the Pyramid destroyed from their last visit, they instead boarded Wolf, Steven riding in his pocket space, to warp there. When they appeared, they found that the Pyramid, once cracked jaggedly in two by Ruby and Opal's fusion, had been given repairs. They were rudimentary, but Jasper's strength had let her move pillars back into place to keep the thing standing while it transmitted.

"So we just gotta wreck it up again right?" Steven said, "Are you guys gonna form Fire Opal again?" He asked excitedly. "Well, that's up to Opal I guess," Ruby said, turning to the archer gem, "What do you say, wanna wreck the place?" She asked, a note of excitement audible in her voice. Opal shook her head, "No." She said simply, "What? But we need to break the place right? Don't we need to be huge like last time?" Ruby asked.

"Last time was a disaster," Opal reminded her, "Fire went on a rampage. She attacked Sapphire, she's the reason we can't even warp here anymore. You can be too aggressive, I can overlook the obvious, and we can both get carried away. So for the time being, Fire Opal is benched. What we need now, is to be careful," Opal turned to Sapphire, "It's you and me Sapphire. Let's fuse."

Sapphire said nothing, but her normally neutral expression became a smile; which may as well have been her erupting with excitement. Ruby frowned, but in his excitement to see another giant woman, Steven didn't notice it as he and Ruby moved back away so Sapphire and Opal could dance. It was brief, and as the fusion formed, it seemed to drop the temperature of the area by several degrees.

The resulting gem was massive, taller than Fire Opal by perhaps ten feet. Sapphire's long dress had merged with Opal's outfit to form one that seemed elegant but didn't hinder movement. Their hair was long and flowing, and icy blue. She smiled, and had three eyes, though still only four arms. She looked herself over, then grinned at Steven, "And here I was starting to think I'd never get the chance to meet you." She said, "I am Snow Opal."

"Giant Woman!" Steven cheered, "You look amazing!" "Why thank you Steven," Snow Opal chuckled, "But we're here to work remember?" She summoned Opal's bow, then Sapphire's focusing shades. She smiled, bringing the two items together. In a flash, Opal was armed with an ice tipped crossbow for sniping. It's size made it almost more of a ballista, and Snow Opal had to use all four hands to use it.

"Wow! Are you gonna smash the Pyramid with your crossbow?" Steven asked. "No, smashing is what a less.. tactful gym would do," Snow Opal said, Ruby looking to the ground, "No, I'm going to be precise." Snow Opal fired, the bolt hitting a connecting joint on one of the pillars holding the structure up and encasing it completely in size, "Focused," Another three frozen joined, "And efficient." A scattershot encased the entire exterior in ice. "And when all the pieces are in place," Snow Opal strode over the pyramid, "Victory will be certain."

She hardly tapped on the structure and the frozen joints gave out, collapsing the pyramid. "And that is how it's done." She said, her crossbow vanishing, "If you ever have an issue like this again, let Opal and Sapphire know, and I'll get the job done before you know it." Snow Opal gave a bow, vanishing as Sapphire and Opal reappeared. "How was that?" Sapphire asked politely.

"We were awesome!" Opal cheered, Steven cheering them on. As they started to leave, Ruby finally noticed Ruby's disappointment, but didn't think too much of it at the time. The next day, the signal from the pyramid was back up. It was choppy, but it was there. This time, when Snow Opal formed, Steven noticed the hurt in Ruby's expression. It became most evident the following day.

Again the pyramid had been repaired over night, though not nearly to its original state. As Snow Opal began lining herself up, Steven could hear what Ruby was saying to herself, too quite to be heard by the fusion, _"I guess you're better off with her. She's probably better for you. I forgot how great it felt to be us.. now you're someone new. I had to use you to make me feel strong, but I don't care about that now.. I see a castle built, out of my mistakes, and I'm watching it come crashing down. Is there something I can do, is there something I can do-o-o-o-o, is there something I can do, can I make it up to you..."_

That night, Steven woke Ruby, and brought her back to the pyramid with Wolf, "Jasper's come and fixed the place up every other night, so she'll probably come by again. And when she does, bam! We'll get her." Steven said. He wasn't sure they actually could beat Jasper even in a three on one, which was a best case scenario of Wolf fighting with them, but at least they'd have the element of surprise.

Unfortunately, it wasn't Jasper who they found repairing the pyramid. What they saw was Sapphire. Her future vision let her see what course of action to take to repair the pyramid just enough to get the signal going, and the armored drone, which Sapphire had intentionally not told them was working again, moved the objects into place when they were too heavy for Sapphire herself.

They were shocked, as was Opal the next morning when they confronted Sapphire. They didn't want to rat her out, but they didn't really have a choice, as the signal Sapphire was repairing was a threat. "That's why you couldn't see us finding Jasper.." Opal said, backing away from Sapphire, "That's why this keeps happening, you were tricking us!" Opal said, anger filling her voice.

"N-no, it really was Jasper.. the first time," Sapphire said, "Being Snow Opal was so amazing.. I-I just wanted to share a few more victories with you." "Those weren't victories, they were wastes of time!" Opal shouted, turning to Ruby, "Ruby, fuse with me." "Are you sure?" The red gem asked nervously, "Let's just get this over with." Opal said coldly.

Ruby walked over, merging with Opal. Fire Opal formed again, her flaming morning star striking the pyramid with more force than she'd been able to last time, fuelled now by Opal's immediate rage for what Sapphire had done. As an added precaution, Fire Opal let the fires spread over the entire structure, burning the mechanisms to a crisp so they couldn't be used for anything as Steven and Sapphire watched fearfully.

* * *

 **Once again, just to clarify for those few people who might decide to try and call me on it, yes, I triple checked, Fire Opal and Snow Opal are actual gems that exist. I know it isn't exactly the most creative choice for a gem fusion, but come on fire and snow? If there are ever canon fusions for Ruby and Opal/Sapphire and Opal (which I don't expect but wouldn't mind) and it isn't Fire/Snow Opal, then a mistake has been made.**


	16. Chapter 16

**Yes, I skipped Keystone motel. Not that it wouldn't be fun to write, but I feel like not only would it not change much, it would actively take away from the episode idea. Ruby's fire burning hot and Sapphire running cold, but Amethyst and Pearl don't generate anything. Sure Amethyst can occasionally ignite her whips, but that's not really enough to go on. Sorry to those who were expecting it.**

* * *

Jasper looked over the Galaxy warp, trying and failing to find a functional warp back to Homeworld. She had doubted that any of the would work, and she was certain that she didn't have the skills to actually fix any of them, but she was running out of ideas. She needed to get off the planet before 'it' happened, and she wasn't sure how much time was left. If nothing else, she was at least glad that she hadn't encountered those Crystal Gems in going on a few straight weeks now, which provided her with a little calm for the time being.

A calm that was shattered when they appeared on one of the few functioning planetary warp pads. It worked!" Sapphire exclaimed excitedly, "See, I told you it would work!" "Gah, why can't you Crystal Gem failures just let me do my work!" She questioned, summoning her helmet. "Give it up Jasper," Opal said, drawing her bow, "This-" "This is the end of the line!" Sapphire interrupted, "We've got you cornered, and even if you try to run, we'll be able to track you down just as fast no matter where you go on this planet!"

Sapphire jumped down from the warp, focusing all her power into her ice abilities, boosting their strength, but completely blinding her future vision for the next few minutes. Her feet formed ice beneath her, essentially letting her skate towards Jasper with her hands ready to completely encase her in ice when the she touched her. Jasper avoided with a spin attack that sent her flying at Opal, who fired several arrows. In spin mode Jasper could cut right through the normal arrows, and charging one up would take too long.

Opal grabbed Ruby and Steven and jumped away from the warp, avoiding Jasper's charge. The quartz gem course corrected, smashing into a pillar behind the Crystal Gems and causing it to start falling. Steven summoned his sword, causing it to grow much larger before forcing it up to block the pillar, "I've got this, you focus on Jasper!" He shouted. Ruby summoned her gauntlet and ran forward.

Jasper's feet were encased in ice by Sapphire's touch, making her a sitting duck for Ruby's burning punch to her gut, followed by a charged arrow from Opal that sent her flying back. "Excellent work Opal!" Sapphire shouted as she rushed forward, wanting to be the one to finish the job. She could see quite a few ways that doing this could go wrong, but she ignored them. She had to be the one to end this, she had seen the version of reality where she captured Jasper and Opal forgave her for her the Snow Opal incident, and she would do almost anything to get to it.

Unfortunately Jasper was back on her feet before Sapphire could freeze her, and Jasper's headbutt, though it didn't hit hard enough to poof her, sent Sapphire flying back. She crashed into Steven, causing his sword to vanish and the pillar to fall, Opal grunting as she tried to hold it up herself. Jasper blocked Ruby's punch with her helmet and knocked her back with a kick before running to another warp pad.

When it did nothing, she groaned in frustration, "Does anything on this garbage planet work!?" "I do!" Steven shouted, summoning his sword again and sending it flying at Jasper. She lowered her head to block it with her helmet, but the force of the impact knocked her off of the warp pad and into Ruby, who burned herself out in an explosive uppercut that sent Jasper into the air.

Sapphire used her future vision quickly, focusing purely on where Jasper was most likely to land. Sapphire aimed her ice powers at the spot and fired to freeze Jasper, not having realized that Opal had stood there intending to catch Jasper and trap her. Sapphire's ice froze Opal in place, leaving no one to capture Jasper, who shattered the ice on impact before bolting to the warp pad the Crystal Gems had appeared on and vanishing.

"I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry!" Sapphire stammered, mentally berating herself. Opal said nothing to her, getting up and going to the warp pad with Steven and Ruby. When they returned to the temple, Sapphire said, "That may not have gone very optimal, but by focusing my future vision on the warp pad activity instead of specifically on Jasper, we can still know exactly where she is an when. It's only a matter of time until we get her, and then we can put this whole thing behind us."

"Sapphire really want to capture Jasper huh?" Steven said, "You think Opal will forgive her when we do?" He asked hopefully, frowning when Ruby shook her head, "No, it doesn't matter. She could bring Jasper in on a silver platter and it wouldn't make up for that stunt she pulled to keep fusing. I thought she of all gems would be able to see that."

Before anything else could be said, Sapphire sensed the warp pads being used. They rushed to the warp and teleported to the one last used, appearing in the desert outside of what looked like a giant sand castle. "What is this place?" Steven asked. "It's an ancient gem location," Sapphire said, "Long ago, gems used the magic of an object called the Desert Glass to build temples out of the sand. It could even be used to create a functional communicator, which is why Jasper's come here. But it's been thousands of years since then, the Desert Glass is too weak to be useful to her now. She's desperate, and she's cornered herself in there."

The gems headed inside the sand castle, finding it completely empty save for Jasper in the corner holding a flat piece of glass, the one controlling the sand. "Give it up Jasper, there's no where left for you to run now," Sapphire said, boosting her ice power again, "Did you really think you could get a functioning communicator to work out here?" She questioned.

Jasper shook her head, "Nope, but I figured I could trap you in here!" She said, her grip on the Desert Glass tightening as spikes began to fly from the walls and ceiling towards the Crystal Gems. Steven summoned his sword, deflecting the spikes that flew at them until they made it into the hallway, where he collapsed tiredly, "Three swords in one day, not too shabby.." He said as Opal picked him up.

Before they could come up with a plan, sand began pouring into the room like rushing water. They ran down the hall to avoid it, just barely making it into another room and shutting the door. Inside they saw Jasper, and Sapphire rushed forward, blasting her with ice, only to find that it was a sand clone. Even Ruby could have predicted that, and the fact that Sapphire hadn't pushed the blue gem into something of a meltdown. She repeatedly fired shards of ice into stop where the clone had been.

That is, until the floor opened up and they started falling. Ruby reacted the fastest, summoning her gauntlet and grabbing the wall as she fell, slowing to a stop. She grabbed Steven and threw him back up into the room before climbing back up herself. "Are you okay?" She called down to Opal and Sapphire. "Yeah, we-" They were cut off by the floor closing, sealing them in.

Steven and Ruby both frantically tried to pry the floor open, until they heard that Sapphire and Opal were talking inside. Well, arguing, but discussion was happening at least. "Maybe they can work things out while they're trapped together?" Steven wondered, a theory that was undermined somewhat by the floor beginning to lower itself to close in on Opal and Sapphire, "Not if they get crushed!" Ruby said, grabbing the floor with her gauntlet hand and trying to hold it back while Steven jammed his sword between the floor and the wall. The two actions slowed the floor down, giving Opal and Sapphire more time.

"I just.. needed to feel it again," Sapphire said, "I'm just a Sapphire, I can see how things should work, but I can't every make anything happen. But you.. you're so powerful, so sure of everything, so perfect, and Snow Opal was.. it was amazing. I just.. wanted to feel less worthless for a little while.." Sapphire said. "You're wrong," Opal said, "After what happened, I was a mess. I came apart, Pearl and Amethyst were at odds even with each other. I don't always know everything, and if I'm honest, there are times when I look to you and wonder what it must feel like to have so much power."

Ruby and Steven's weapons gave and the floor began to sink again. "There's only one way out of this Sapphire." Opal said. "Only if you're okay with it." Sapphire said. Steven and Ruby were panicking when a hole was blasted through the floor, Snow Opal jumping out, grabbing Steven and Ruby, and rushing through the sand castle, walls breaking as she rushed through them without stopping. Jasper had already left, but the Crystal Gems manage to get out before the entire castle collapsed.

Snow Opal unfused, Opal and Sapphire panting, "It's okay, we'll get her next time. Right?" Sapphire asked. Opal nodded, smiling, "Right."


	17. Chapter 17

Steven woke to being dragged out of bed by the muscled orange quartz gem that they had been trying to find for weeks now. Jasper's strength made it impossible for Steven to struggle out of her grip, and she held a hand over his mouth to prevent him from calling out to the others as she carried him to the temple's warm pad and teleported them both somewhere else.

They appeared at the Galaxy Warp. "I'm done with this." Jasper said, dropping Steven onto one of the busted warps. "What do you want?" Steven questioned. "I want to get off of this garbage planet!" Jasper shouted angrily, "But I've got no more bots, I've got no more ship, I've got no attendants, and I've got no response from Red Beryl!" Jasper took a few deep breaths to calm herself down before turning to Steven, "I know you fixed the Peridot's gem. Whatever you did to her, you've got to do it to the Homeworld warp, or else!" Jasper punctuated this by summoning her helmet.

Steven backed away nervously, "Alright, alright! Just give me a second to focus." He said, closing his eyes and trying to think of something sad to make himself cry. With the mention of Peridot, it wasn't too had to bring himself to tears, though only a few drops fell from his face and hit the warp. There was a few moments of nothing happening before Jasper lost her patience, "Was that it? That did nothing!"

"I'm sorry, it doesn't always work." Steven admitted. Jasper went silent, looking at him before dropping to a sitting position, looking defeated, "Then that's it then.. this, this was my shot at getting off of this planet.. I'm going to die here.." She seemed to be talking more to herself than to Steven, but Steven was never able to resist the urge to comfort those in distress around him, and said, "Hey, the Earth isn't that bad."

"It doesn't matter how good or bad the Earth is," Jasper said, "It won't be anything soon." "Wait.. what?" Steven questioned. Before anymore questions or answers could be given, one of the warps activated, the Crystal Gems appearing, no doubt one of Sapphire's visions had tipped them off. "There he is, hurry!" The short blue gem said, all three rushing over. Jasper groaned in dismay, getting up and running for one of the functional warp pads.'

Ruby got to it first, smashing it with her gauntlet. Jasper was about to return the favor by flattening Ruby when Sapphire's ice tripped her up. She stumbled back, Ruby and Sapphire closing in, forming Garnet and grappling the still slightly larger gem. "Don't you idiots know that you need me?!" She questioned as she struggled against Garnet's strength, "I'm the only one who knows about the-"

Jasper was cut off by one of Opal's charge arrows hitting her in the back, poofing her instantly. Garnet unfused and Opal bubbled the Homeworld gem, "We finally got her." She said, sending her to the temple. "But what was she saying?" Steven asked, "She was afraid of something, and I don't mean us. I think she knew something that we didn't." He explained.

"Just lies and tricks from a gem who knew she was caught," Opal said, "Don't waste anymore thought on her now." Ruby nodded in agreement, but Sapphire didn't look so sure, likely able to sense that something was off. He knew that, after the Snow Opal debacle, there was no chance of Sapphire following up on her suspicions, but Steven could still do it for her.

When they'd returned, Steven snuck out from his room and into the room where the bubbled gems went . It didn't take too long to find Jasper among the other bubbled gems, and he cut her out of her bubble with his sword. She reformed, making a motion like she were throwing Garnet, "Cluster you traitorous wastes of rock!" She said, taking a moment to realize where she was.

She looked at Steven with his sword drawn and the dozens, if not hundreds, of bubbled gems above of her and dropped to her knees, "I'm going to be harvested, aren't I?" She sounded dejected, like she had given up hope and accepted her fate. "I don't want to harvest you, I just want to talk to you." He said, Jasper watching him carefully, not trusting him.

"What about?" She asked. "You know something, don't you?" Steven asked, "Something that the Crystal Gems don't. I saw how scared you were." "Of course I know," Jasper said, "I know everything there is to know about the Cluster. It was my mission, the reason I even came to this rock in the first place. I was just supposed to check it's status, in and out real quick before it hatches. But now I'm stuck here, and when it emerges, we'll all be shattered!"

"What is the Cluster?" Steven asked. Jasper sighed, "Are you sure you want to know?" She questioned him. "Of course, what is it?" Steven asked, his anticipation growing. Jasper beckoned for him to lean in so she could whisper it, but when he did, she punched him in the gut, sending him flying across the room. He managed to form a bubble around himself before he crashed, but by the time he had recovered the breath that had been knocked out of him, Jasper had climbed out of the temple and into the actual house.

When Steven went to see what had happened, she found that Jasper had rather ill-advisedly tried to take the three Crystal Gems head on, possibly some kind of quartz thing. Regardless, the result was her frozen in place, unable to move. Steven figured that so long as she wasn't poofed, they could still figure out something to do with her and this 'Cluster'.


	18. Chapter 18

**Warning: implies Pearlmyst. Please keep in mind that this is only because of the format of the story, and I'm not actually trying to push this ship in any way.**

* * *

Steven opened his eyes with a start to see Opal above him. "Steven, happy birthday!" She said, careful not to wake the others. They'd been staying at the barn since Jasper had explained to them about the Cluster, the mass of millions of shards from shattered gems buried in the earth. When it took form, its mere size would rip the earth apart from the inside, and there was no telling how much damage it would then do to other planets that Homeworld sent it to attack. It had to be stopped. Jasper was only helping for the sake of her own life, but she was helping at least.

But at the moment, Opal and Steven didn't have that on their minds. "Is it morning already?" Steven asked, looking over and seeing darkness outside. "It's midnight," Opal said, "But it still counts." Steven smiled, "Are you finally going to tell me how you're a fusion of Pearl and Amethyst held together indefinitely by the love between two gems?" He asked excitedly.

Opal rolled her eyes, "You already know about that." She said. Steven frowned, and sighed in ever so slight disappointment, "You're right, I do." He sighed. "But you don't know how Pearl and Amethyst first met." Opal pointed out, Steven gasped in surprise at the idea of hearing the story, "Oh my gosh, you're right, I don't!" Opal grinned, "It all happened on earth, hundreds of years ago.."

* * *

Amethyst had only just emerged from her hole in the Kindergarten. She looked herself over, and looked over the place around her. She knew who she was, or at least, she believed she knew who and what she was supposed to be. She was a soldier.. right? But for who? There was no one in this place, everything around her was empty and dead. Not to mention that she was small, much to short to be a soldier for anyone. She was so confused..

So she tried to keep herself busy. She ran around the Kindergarten, talking to the rocks, playing with the rocks, even fighting some of the rocks. Over the course of her first year, she learned all about her powers. Well, most of them. She didn't know how to summon a gem weapon, or even that she could. And even though she didn't know it yet, she was lonely.

Then one day she heard a noise. There was a very small number of noises the Kindergarten made, and this noise wasn't one of them. This was some kind of growing.. hissing.. slithering.. it wasn't the right noise whatever it was. Amethyst followed the noise out of curiosity, wondering if she was finally about to learn who or what she was for real. She'd never been more excited.

When she peeked around a corner, she was shocked to see three other gems, one huge with massive pink hair, one shorter and thin with two swords, and one small and blue. But they weren't the only ones there, there were monsters. Big, crazy looking things; but then again, anything that wasn't a rock was at least kinda crazy to Amethyst at this point in time.

The three gems were fighting them off together, and doing a good job. The blue one looked over at where Amethyst was suddenly, catching her off guard. Amethyst was sure she hadn't made any noise, but without having even seen her, the blue gem knew where to walk to find her. "Hello there." She said softly, "You do not need to worry, we're only here to defeat these corrupted gems, we.."

The blue gem suddenly stopped talking, her neutral expression becoming grave, "No, Pearl no don't!" She got up and turned around to the fight. One of the monsters had gotten a surprise attack on the big pink gem and knocked her down, poofing her. The thin gem was guarding her, and over there by herself, it seemed clear she would be much more than just poofed by the time it was over. Sapphire would later say how she had watched Pearl's shattering happen in her mind's eye, sensed her accepting her fate.

But Amethyst, Amethyst could not accept it. She jumped out of cover, running over to Pearl faster than Sapphire had seen any gem, especially a quartz, move. She collided with Pearl, but rather than them both just falling to the ground, only one body landed; Opal. I didn't look like I do now, I was shorter, and from what the others told me, my hair and clothes were a nightmare, a chaotic, rushed combination of Pearl and Amethyst, but it felt..

Well, it felt right, even though neither part of me knew what it was. Neither of them had fused before, Amethyst didn't even know what fusion was, and Pearl thought it could only happen between two gems of the same type. Yet here I was. Even with how shocked I was, without knowing what I was, I understood action. I jumped at the monster attacking Rose with swords drawn in two hands, the other two holding the monster in place while I poofed it.

Rose reformed right as the battle was ending, her eyes widening when she saw me. When I looked back and saw her, something switched gears, and I fell apart. Amethyst was so confused, and Pearl had never been more embarrassed in her life. Rose told her it was okay, and that she was glad to see it. If anything, this just made Pearl more embarrassed and Amethyst more confused.

For awhile, Pearl even hated Amethyst. Well, she told herself she did anyway. It was easier to just be mad at this random raggedy gem than it was to face her attraction to her. They took Amethyst in, showed her to the temple, to the bubble room. They trained together, fought together. She was a Crystal Gem. But for a long while, Amethyst tried to avoid Pearl, not wanting to upset her more; but neither of them would be able to go very long without thinking about me.

Slowly, they went from avoiding each other to talking politely with the others around, then to talking politely alone, then to talking normally to each other. Nearly a year had passed when I came back, when they couldn't stop themselves any longer. I marched right into Rose's room. I was going to tell her that I intended to be me, and if she didn't like it, she could just deal with it. I was a mess of Amethyst being defensive, Pearl being nervous, and both of them being unsure what Rose would think; for vastly different reasons mind you.

When Rose actually saw me, she smiled, and everything I'd wanted to say just.. melted. I wasn't sure what to do, what to say, or even what to be. Wanna know what Rose said when I told her that? She said, "Don't you ever question anything like that. Don't ever question this. You already are the answer."

* * *

 **Okay, let me address a few things. 1: Yes I know, I've skipped quite a bit getting here, but I'm not sure how much of a difference is made by the Switchverse formula to episodes like When It Rains. As I warned before, occasionally things are going to jump around a but.**

 **2: Yes, I did imply in earlier chapters that Sapphire was the one in this version who had a crush on Rose. I figured that since Opal the ship would be so inherent and unavoidable in this story, I may as well nullify Pearl being the one with the feelings for her.**

 **But then it was brought to my attention that I don't need to, as I've been trying to keep all the characters as close to their original roles as possible with only slight changes in placement.**


	19. Chapter 19

**I'm of the belief that Alexandrite is specifically the fusion of a Garnet, an Amethyst, and a Pearl. Meaning that if Amethyst, Pearl, Ruby, and Sapphire, or in this case, Opal, Ruby, and Sapphire fused, then the result out not be an Alexandrite. However, I know this theory is not well liked, so I'll keep it to myself. You can't deny that the weapon choice and mind set would be different though.**

* * *

When the Crystal Gems started seeing the tremors going through the water, they, as well as Jasper, assumed naturally that the Cluster had begun to take form sooner than they had anticipated, as minor quakes were one of the signs meant to indicate its taking of form. The drill was ready thankfully, and they could go whenever they wanted, but Steven stopped them when they made a beeline for the machine. His mental powers, the ones he still had the least control over, had started acting up in his sleep again. And this time, he'd seen a fusion they'd all forgotten about recently, rising out of the ocean.

"Aventurine?" Opal questioned. "That's what Lapis and Peridot are calling themselves," Steven said, "Or maybe their minds are actually working as one now.. I don't know. But she's back! She's by the communication hub. Peridot's still holding her back, but I don't think she can keep it up much longer." Opal nodded, "Stay here with Jasper and the drill, we'll handle this. Gems, to the warp pad!"

Opal, Ruby, and Sapphire ran off towards the warp pad, teleporting to the communication hub. When they arrived, they saw that Steven had been right; Aventurine was above water, chains of liquid metal still binding her as her liquid metal wings tried desperately to break her free. "Maybe I can hit Lapis's gem from here if I hurry." Opal said, reaching to summon her bow.

Sapphire stopped her, "No, if you attempt that, the odds of actually successfully hitting Lapis's gem without damaging Peridot are slim to none. More likely, you miss and your arrows help free her. You know what we have to do." Opal sighed, "You're right. Haven't had to use her in years." "You don't mean.." Ruby's eyes widened as Opal nodded, "We're putting an end to this, and we need Alexandrite to do it."

Opal reached out with all four hands, two for Ruby, two for Sapphire, and began to dance with them both, her flexible nature letting her match the both of them at once. They began to glow, merging together and growing large, creating the massive gem Alexandrite. She was less than a head lower than the entire height of the tower she was standing next to, making her several dozen times larger than Aventurine.

As they formed, the chains finally broke, freeing the twisted fusion. "Finally.. I wasn't expecting you to last this long, I'm impressed." She said to herself. "Aventurine!" Alexandrite roared from the second jaw beneath her face. "What? No, I- stop! Weak.. we've been holding us back too long. I think it's time we have some fun." Aventurine turned to Alexandrite, flying at roughly eye level with the four gem fusion.

"We're only giving you one warning. We don't have to fight. You're outnumbered." Alexandrite said. Aventurine grinned cruelly, "I may be outnumber," Her hands moved, the water rising behind her in a massive wave that didn't crash, remaining still behind her like a cannon ready to fire, "But you're outclassed. I can't way to break you gems apart!" She threw her hands forward, and the tidal wave surged forward.

Alexandrite summoned Fire Opal's morning star, a burning strike countering the wall of water. As she turned to look for Aventurine, the metal making up the communication hub began to move, reaching out and wrapping around Alexandrite, chains and bars forming to hold her in place as Aventurine sent a storm of water, now frozen into ice shards, raining down on her.

Alexandrite grit both sets of teeth in pain before the lower jaw opened up and a blast of fire spewed out, melting the ice and engulfing Aventurine. She flew fast, avoiding too much damage, but was unfocused long enough for Alexandrite to free herself from the metal of the tower; which she promptly tore from the ground and flew at the liquid metal fusion in anger.

Aventurine caught it with her powers, prying it apart and changing the shape of the various metal chunks. What before had been a single solid tower was now a storm of drills fling at Alexandrite. She summoned Sapphire's shades and Opal's bow, focusing her future sight to avoid the drills and shoot the ones she couldn't out of the way. When the drill storm passed, she put the shades and bow together to create Snow Opal's crossbow, firing at Aventurine.

Fast as Aventurine was, she couldn't outrun future vision, and was hit by an ice arrow. She crashed to the ground in a chunk of ice, which she promptly melted, only to be punched into the ground by Garnet's gauntlets. Aventurine stumbled, dazed and in pain for a moment as gauntlets appeared on all six of Alexandrite's hands, all six of them throwing off sparks with the amount of electricity they were throwing off.

The ground shook with the force of Alexandrite's repeated strikes to the ground, every hit felt all the way back at the barn, and each impact discharging lightning through Aventurine. And still, when Alexandrite had to stop to breathe, Aventurine flew up. She was hurt, but it didn't seem like there was much that could separate the two gems. Their bitterness, despite coming from different sources, and to some extent being aimed at each other, was keeping them on the same wavelength mentally, making the fusion incredibly powerful.

"Like Fire Opal, but about a hundred times worse." Alexandrite muttered to herself as a wall of water and steel rose on either side of her, both walls solidifying before flying at her to crush her. Alexandrite held out all six arms, and still only barely managed to stop the walls from meeting. Both of them began melting, enveloping the large fusion and lifting her into the air before flying down hard and crashing into the ground.

"Sorry, but there's only room enough for one abomination on this planet," Aventurine said, another metal drill forming above Alexandrite, this one massive and spilling as it was launched at her, "But thank you for opening my eyes about fusion." She added mockingly. Fire Opal's morning star saved her, crashing into the drill with enough force to send it careening in the other direction, and not losing any momentum, letting it continue to spin and hit Aventurine in the same motion, flinging her into the air.

The morning star vanished, Alexandrite summoning Opal's bow, Ruby's gauntlet, and Sapphire's shades. She brought the three weapons together, the result being a massive trebuchet. Aventurine spread her wings and righted herself, only to see a large ball of energy rocketing towards her. "You two should spend some time apart." Were the last words Aventurine head before the ball hit her, blasting Lapis and Peridot apart.

Alexandrite caught them both, lowering them to the ground before poofing. Opal, Ruby, and Sapphire landed on the beach with their every nerve and muscle screaming, and the desire to simply retreat into their gems for healing overwhelming. Unfortunately they wouldn't get the chance, as the island that had once housed the communication hub now shook violently. They hadn't noticed it during the battle due to their size, but the quakes had continued even after Aventurine had freed herself. Jasper had been right; the Cluster was forming.


End file.
